Entwined Frontiers
by Pandamoniam
Summary: Becoming a Warden with your twin is awesome, right? Heck no. It's fighting with each other and random bad guys, sharing rooms AND Bone Buggies, enduring endless taunting; basically, it's just the worst. And Jura and Tria are doing all that while stopping some stupid gang from taking over the world. Who knows, maybe they'll kill each other first.
1. Arrivals and Freckles

**Well, I'm trying out writing a Frontier fanfic, yay! There will definitely be spoilers since, well, this is kind of a replay, in a way, but there will also be a lot of differences as this progresses. Just a heads up. But, without further ado...**

* * *

_Tires screeched as a reddish-orange Bone Buggy skidded to a halt. The door opened and a tall, lean figure leaped out, immediately breaking out in a dash as his feet hit the ground. Long coat fanning out behind him, the brunet shot towards a metal, gold colored chair-like object. He came to a halt behind it, dark blue eyes blazing with aggression._

"_I've got you now, Dr. Blackraven!" the man shouted, leaning forward for emphasis. "The Black Whale is completely surrounded, give yourself up!"_

_The man in the chair chuckled, his seat bobbing with each laugh. "Ah Stryker, my old friend. I'm surprised you made it this far." He paused, the contraption spinning around so that he was now facing the taller male. A wide smirk was plastered to his stout face. "I've underestimated you. Perhaps the brave men and women of INTERFOL are not quite the fools I took them for."_

"_But be that as it may, I have no intention of going quietly." His chair took flight, hovering backwards as he broke out in snickers. Stryker tensed up, prepared for what was coming. Grinning, Dr. Blackraven pressed a few buttons on the armrest of his throne. With a flash, a piece of metal shot from the back, exploding into a giant, ferocious reptile,_

_Green skin laced with thick, bronze stripes rippled as the large jawed Giganto materialized, a snarl in its throat. Frowning, Stryker turned and jogged back to his Bone Buggy, eyes narrowing as he pointed at the beast before him._

"_You don't scare me, Doctor! Have a taste of my Spino ST!"_

_A loud bang reverberated through the metallic room as his Bone Buggy shot out a circular piece of metal similar to the Giganto's. Flashing, it grew into an equally large creature with grey-purple skin, Intricate patterns of gold, blue, and red laced the sail on its back, as well as its forehead. Crimson scales made up its underside._

"_It's time for you to face justice, Blackraven!"_

_The two Vivosaurs broke out in fighting, a flurry of teeth and claws as they slammed into each other. Spino ST seemed to have the advantage, though, and its jaws snapped shut around the Giganto's neck. With a flick of its spine, it threw the brawny brute off balance, then drilled into its side with its snout. A final tackle sent the staggering Giganto flying into the wall, its body shrinking back into the small circular bit of metal._

_A few sparks burst from Blackraven's chair, before the back of it went up in black smoke. It sputtered and shook, causing its plump rider to slip into a rather awkward position. "N-no… Not like this…" he stammered, teeth grit. "Not when I was so close! If only I could have completed him, this pathetic world would have been mine!"_

_Fingers tapped at the red buttons slowly as Blackraven struggled to regain his composure. Behind him, the walls parted like massive jaws, revealing a bubbling red liquid trapped behind glass. In its center, curled up like an embryo, was a massive, spiked creature, tubes connected to various parts of its body._

_Stryker cringed, expression incredulous. "Th-that's…" His face scrunched up as disgust entered his voice. "Blackraven, you madman… What have you done?!"_

* * *

Hands clenched into fists as the film reached its conclusion. He could remember that day so vividly. Sitting in his living room, eyes glued to the TV screen, as the footage of the famous battle was played over the local news. His sister had been out playing with her friends or something; whatever the reason, she was not present. And now, five years later, he was watching that same fight. Only now, everyone seemed to be bored of it.

Upon the darkened screen, a wall of white text filled in the area where the combating Vivosaurs had once been. Groans filled the air as the passengers realized they were still required to stay in the room and read. The view of the upcoming island would have been much more exhilarating for them.

He was seated in the back, a redhead around the age of fifteen grinning, green eyes wide and attentive. Built tall and scrawny, his white and orange short-sleeved shirt hung loosely over his slouching frame, and his blue and black denim shorts seemed much too large. A small, yellow bandanna was wrapped snugly around his neck; a similar, longer bit of material hung from his belt. However, the strangest part of his outfit was his bright red hair spiking through the top of his pilot's cap.

Unlike the other people completely ready to get off the boat, he was perfectly content where he was. In fact, the reading was only enhancing the experience. Deciding to include someone else in said experience, he began to nudge the blue haired girl beside him awake.

Mauve eyes creaked open grouchily as she straightened out her posture in a sluggish manner. The two of them were dressed similarly, what with the matching bandannas. Her color scheme differed, though, as her crop top and shorts were pink and black. Despite her smaller size, her clothes actually fit snugly, not that her figure was filled out enough for that to be significant. Lastly, her blue locks were tied up by a large, pink bow.

Excitement suppressed itself upon seeing her awake, and the teen's bright eyes dimmed down and lidded ever-so-slightly. He was still feeling a bit mischievous, though. Gaze wandering back to the text-filled screen, he began to read it off aloud.

"The Wardens - An organization that maintains peace and ensures safety at the world's Fossil Parks."

"Jura, don't you freaking dare read that," the girl grumbled groggily, blinking away her drowsiness. He brushed off her threat and continued.

"Wardens drive around Fossil Parks in vehicles known as Bone Buggies, which help them explore, excavate, and take part in lively Fossil Battles with their vivosaurs-"

"I'm serious Jura, knock it off."

"But these parks are more than just fun and games…"

"_Jura_."

"And when trouble occurs in one of the vast dig sites that surround these parks, it's up to the Wardens to jump into their Bone Buggies and save the day! Woohoo!"

Gloved hands shoved against his shoulder, pushing the freckle-faced boy over. His companion glared at him, anger evident in her posture. With a laugh, Jura brushed himself off and stood up, fingers adjusting his pilot's cap.

"Oh come on, sis. Lighten up, will you? We're almost to Fossil Park Asia, so stop acting like we're almost to school." A smile twitched across her face, freckles emphasizing the grin. Getting up to her feet, she gave him a quick punch to his arm and darted off towards the door at the side of the room.

Jura's eyes scanned the room one last time, surprised to find it empty. Realization struck him - they must have been very close to arrival. With a yelp, he jogged out after his sister. "Tria! Tria, wait for me!"

The blunette smirked, turning towards her brother as he clumsily ran over to her. The rest of their group had already gotten off the boat, so he was glad she had waited for him. Nodding to one another, the duo made their way down the loading ramp.

It was quite pleasant out, and the island before them reflected it. The grass was lusciously green, the water clear and shimmering; even the pavement and structures in front of them seemed to be in their prime due to the summer weather. Jura took a deep breath, gleefully taking in the salty scent. It was definitely the perfect day to become a Warden.

A blonde young woman dressed in a white jacket and jeans greeted them once they had reached the bottom. "Hello, and welcome to Fossil Park Asia, home of Warden HQ." She gestured to the large building behind the mechanical dinosaur towering over her. "Just head into that building, and someone will get you signed up."

Tria immediately dashed off for the building, leaving her brother behind. He chuckled awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck. Languid eyes glanced at the lady beside him. "Sorry about that. Thank you for the directions, ma'm."

She smiled, dismissing it with the wave of a hand. "It's fine. To be honest, most people react like that. You're one of the first to actually answer me. Well, besides that blonde girl from earlier…" The woman shook her head, forgetting the thought. "Just go on ahead, and have a great day!"

"You, too!" Jura chirped, walking towards the large building his sister had disappeared into. The automatic doors slid apart, much to his surprise, and he stepped in. His black and pink clad sibling was standing in front of a desk, practically vibrating with enthusiasm.

The woman at the desk, black haired and grey eyed with a white jacket and pink skirt, grinned as he joined Tria in standing in front of the desk. She pulled out a clipboard and pen, scanning it over quickly before formally acknowledging them.

"Oh! Hi there! Welcome to Warden HQ!" She clicked the end of her pen, ready to write. "First off, we need you to register yourself in our database. So, what are your names?"

"Tria and Jura!" the more eager of the two blurted out, her feet shifting from anticipation. The guide giggled, amused by her reaction, and began to skim over her list.

"Right-o! Let's see what we have here…" Eyes lit up. "So you're Tria and Jura, the twin Warden candidates, eh?" Energetic nods answered, and she scribbled something down on the paper. Satisfied, she slipped the clipboard back under the desk and smiled.

"Since this is your first time here, let me show you around the lobby."

"Ooo boy…" Tria grumbled under her breath, pink eyes rolling. Her brother gave her a stern glare, silencing her.

"First of all, I'm the receptionist here at Fossil Park Asia. I track new registrations and that sort of thing." She motioned over towards the woman in overalls off to the left. "She's in charge of the Help Desk. If you have any questions about anything, she knows the answers." The guide paused, seemingly debating if she would continue with her explanation.

She chose otherwise. "So then! I take it you're here to attend today's Warden candidate meeting?"

"Heck yeah!" Tria cheered, while Jura nodded politely. The guide smiled and pointed to the elevator behind her.

"The other candidates have already gathered in the Captain's Office, so I'd hustle if I were you. Oh, and that Office is on the top floor, by the way."

"Cool, thanks!" Jura grinned, cringing once he noticed that his sister was already waiting for the elevator to open. He waved to the receptionist and jogged up to Tria, vaguely frustrated.

The doors slid apart and the twins stepped in. Slightly angered green eyes met excited pink before words were spoken. "You really should be more polite."

"You really should stop being such a drag," Tria snorted back, crossing her arms. Silence broke out between them, the hum of the elevator filling it quite peacefully.

Eventually a ding sounded, and the two emerged into a large room with a glass window at the back. Six people; two girls and four boys, filled the room. One of the girls, dressed in an orange skirt and a white jacket with black checkering on the cuffs, walked up to them. Her red hair was a few shades darker than Jura's, but was definitely neater.

She smirked, a hand on her hip. "Oh, hey! Look who FINALLY decided to show up!" Her amber eyes scanned them both over, almost in a confused manner. Maybe it was how they were dressed. Jura shifted uncomfortably, glad when she took a step back. He and Tria never really had a sense of the trends.

Off to the side, a boy with spiked up purple hair held back by two red hair clips snickered, appearing rather smug. "Pfft. What a couple of rookies." Even in his layering of shirts, his outfit still seemed to fit in just fine. There was that darn discomfort again. Everyone did think they dressed weird.

"Er, is someone running late?" the plump brunet in the back piped up, hands slipping into the pockets of his green sweatshirt with a triceratops skull inscribed on the front of it. "Because I was under the impression the last two candidates we were waiting on were both boys."

Tria glared at him, letting out an indignant 'hmph'. However, before anything could come of it, the elevator doors slid open, and someone burst out, shoving Jura and Tria as he shot in.

"OUTTA THE WAY! I'M RUNNING LATE!"

His blue eyes looking around frantically, the newest arrival, a pink haired boy, danced from foot to foot. He was dressed in a blue and white jacket with navy blue stripes going down the sleeves and back. A pair of orange and silver goggles dangled from his neck.

"Sorry! So sorry! Apologies all around! Milo ran off with my alarm clock this morning!" He paused, hands on his knees as he took a moment to catch his breath. He straightened his back after a minute, appearing a bit more calm this time. "Milo's my dog, see? Good dog, but yeah. He likes to steal machinery. My clock… My wristwatch… My awesome miniature robot… My grandpa's pacemaker… He snatches it up, runs back to his doghouse, and slobbers all over it. Seriously weird. Don't ask me why."

His blue eyes went wide as it occurred to him that all eyes were on him. "Huh? What's the deal? Why's everyone looking at me?"

The purple haired boy from earlier snorted, rolling his eyes. "Can it already! No one cares!"

With a smile, the blonde girl that had been standing beside Tria walked up to the panicked teen. She placed a calming hand on his shoulder, beaming. "Aw, it's OK. The captain isn't even here yet."

His posture relaxed dramatically, and he slouched over excessively. "For real? Man, that's a relief!"

However, his relief vanished almost instantly, as the sound of the elevator opening echoed through the room. Cringing, the pink haired boy straightened out immediately, spinning around to greet the newcomer.

"Uh-oh…"

Boots thumped against the metal floor as a tall, lean man stepped in. His dark blue eyes shone with interest, but his rather extravagant coat and clean, white gloves gave him a slightly intimidating air. Still, he was smiling, so that was a good sign.

"Sorry to keep everyone waiting," he chuckled nervously as he made his way to the front of the room. The group parted, eagerly making a path for him. His eyes scanned the room, causing Jura to stand up straighter. Even if he and Tria were dressed a bit... eccentrically, perhaps he could make up for it in every other aspect.

The man seemed to take note of Jura and Tria specifically, as he nodded ever-so-slightly upon spotting them. However, he continued with his introduction, grinning pleasantly.

"Nice to meet you all. I'm the leader of the Wardens, Captain Stryker." No one answered, just glanced around awkwardly waiting to see if someone would. After a few moments of silence, the boy closest to Stryker, who was dressed similarly to the pink haired teen but had navy blue hair and glasses, approached the man.

Making eye contact and keeping completely confident posture, much to everyone's disbelief, the teen held out his hand and piped out, "You're the man who saved the world! It's a real honor to meet you, sir."

A bit surprised by the looks of it, but still shaking the boy's hand, Stryker grinned. "Er, thank you!"

From behind him, Jura could have sworn he heard the purple haired guy mutter "kiss up". But, he could have imagined it, too. He was pretty nervous.

Stryker cleared his throat, then walked back towards to elevator. He had picked up a clipboard from his desk, and was now checking it over. "Right, Time for roll call. First up… Penny!"

The blonde with her hair in two ponytails flinched at her name being called, but still made sure to answer with a nervous "Here, sir!"

"Roland!"

Now the plump brunet responded. "H-here!"

"Dahlia!"

"Rockin' and rollin', sir!" the female redhead grinned, pumping a gloved fist into the air.

"Leon!"

The rather grouchy purple haired teen grunted slightly in confirmation.

"Nate!"

"Oh, hey, Captain! I'm here! Right here! Totally ready to go!" the pink haired teen sputtered, still trying to regain his confidence after what had happened earlier. Jura felt his sympathy go out to him. Hopefully that guy would calm down soon.

"Yamamoto!"

"Present and accounted for!" the 'kiss up', as Leon had so kindly put, responded.

"Sydney!"

This time, the brunet dressed in safari gear that Jura had not noticed earlier, answered. "Crikey, mate! Got me didgeridoo all warmed up to play some Waltzin' Matilda for ya!"

"What did he just say?" Tria hissed to her brother. He shrugged, unsure himself.

Stryker seemed to be a bit surprised as well, judging by his answer. "Um.. OK, then. And last on the list, Jura and Tria."

"Here, sir!" Jura stated, trying his hardest to look professional. However, his sister's reply made that rather hard.

"Right here, man!" she grinned, hopping from foot to foot. All eyes went to her for a moment, though Stryker seemed not to mind, as he continued his spiel.

Letting his arm with the clipboard fall to his side, the tall man continued. "You were all chosen to be here today because of your exceptional performance on the third test. But though you all show great promise, you still have plenty to prove if you hope to join the Wardens."

"First off, we're going to show you the basic skills needed for this job. This includes Bone Buggy operation, as well as fossil excavation and vivosaur revival. In fact, you'll be required to use the vivosaurs you revive to pass your Warden Test."

Cringing at the thought of Bone Buggies, Jura cast an anxious glance to his excited sibling. She failed to acknowledge it, but her enthusiasm helped calm his nerves. He and fast moving machines did not mix well.

"I know this is a lot to take in, but I trust you all can handle it." Stryker stopped for a moment, trying his best to appear as encouraging as possible. "After all, if I didn't believe in each and every one of you, you wouldn't be standing here right now."

Somehow, that last statement managed to make Jura feel a little bit better. He felt his muscles ease up this time, which combined with the effect Tria had on him actually made him feel quite content. Stryker seemed to notice, and he also looked relieved.

"Right, well, the first order of business is to become familiar with your Bone Buggies. Leave this building, and head just past the large mechanical dinosaur in the open square outside. There, you'll find the Bone Buggy depot, or what we call the Garage. An instructor will be waiting for you. Speak to him to proceed."

"Good luck to everyone, and let's be cautious out there. Dismissed!"

The group filed out past Stryker, Dahlia and Nate running, Penny and Roland almost too nervous to move. But, they did all eventually make it out. Jura found himself exiting the elevator about the same time as Penny, Tria having ran ahead out of excitement.

The poor blonde was shaking like a leaf. Her blue eyes were wide, quite similar to how Nate had been earlier. A deep sigh escaped her lips, causing her body to give one last great tremble before easing up slightly.

"Hooo! I was a nervous wreck in there!" she sang, trying to ease her quaking joints. "My hands are still shaking. My knees too!"

Jura smiled, giving her a quick pat on the back. "Well, we're out of there now, eh? You don't have to be so nervous."

She looked up at him, gratitude evident. Still, she seemed to think an explanation was needed. "I mean, it's not every day you meet someone as famous as Captain Stryker."

"Relax, I was nervous too," he replied, taking a moment to stretch his own limbs out. Now that he thought of it, everything was quite stiff after that meeting. He really had been stressed.

Penny giggled, hands clasped. "I know, right? I think it's normal to be nervous when you meet someone like that… Glad I wasn't the only one."

"Anyway, you probably heard this in roll call, but my name's Penny."

"I'm Jura," the redhead grinned, tugging at the material around his neck. It was his natural reaction to talking with most girls, really.

"Nice to meet you, Jura," she chirped, smiling warmly. Turning, the pink and pastel green clad girl walked away, elongated pigtails flowing behind her.

Upon exiting the building and walking past the mechanical dinosaur, just as instructed, Jura found himself staring at Tria and Dahlia talking quite excitedly. While it was nice to see that his sister had made a friend, the fact that said friend made him kind of nervous was a bit of a downer. Oh well.

He approached the two of them cautiously, only to have the amber eyed of the duo practically jump out in front of him. Her orbs blazed with curiosity.

"Oh! You're Jura, right? Tria was just talking about you!" She grinned, a hand going up to her hip. "You here for the driving lesson? 'Cause I am! Bone Buggies are the BEST! They're the main reason I want to be a Warden, actually."

"Really?" Jura replied, trying to be friendly. "That's pretty-"

"It's my dream to cruise around in a Bone Buggy for hours on end, going faster… and faster… and FASTER! What do you think?"

"I, uh-"

"Bone Buggies rule!" Tria exclaimed, jumping up and pushing her brother to the side quite forcefully. He stumbled away, regaining his balance by placing a hand on a cardboard cutout of Stryker. Green eyes watched in annoyance as Dahlia pumped her fist.

"Yes! I KNEW you'd understand! I like you already!"

The next five minutes were spent listening to the shorter redhead squeal about different parts of Bone Buggies, what they did, what parts were available, stuff like that. Jura was fairly certain that it was something he couldn't care less about, but Tria seemed interested. So, he figured he'd humor her.

"-I'm totally freaking out here!" Dahlia squealed, finally finishing her rant. She took a few deep breaths jokingly. "OK, breathe, girl, Breeeathe…" An apologetic look was cast to Jura. "Sorry. I'm such a gearhead sometimes."

"Tell me about it…" the older teen sighed, rolling his eyes. Still, he waved to her as she uttered a farewell and jogged off to go take her Bone Buggy lesson.

A brief silence fell between the siblings in her absence. It wasn't necessarily awkward, just… different. Mainly because of the lack of energy. Not that that was a bad thing.

Tria was the first to pipe up. "Well, she seems cool. Guess I've made my first friend! How about you, Jura?"

"Yeah, I made a friend. You remember that blonde girl, right?" His twin paused to think, a finger tapping at her chin occasionally.

"Er, Penny, right?"

"Yeah. We're friends now."

"Cool."

More silence as they both stared in the direction of the instructor. This time, Jura led the way. With an aura of calmness to him, he approached the slim, well-toned man. He was Chinese, dressed in what looked to be sleeveless traditional warrior robes of red with a yellow sash tied around his waist. His black hair was tied back in a long braid, though a tuft of his bangs stuck stubbornly from his forehead.

"Hello there. I'm Liu Ren. I'll be your instructor today." He smiled when he noticed the growing excitement from Tria. "I take it you're ready for your lesson?"

"Darn right we are!" she cheered. Jura nodded, greatly lacking the eagerness of his sister.

Liu Ren responded with a quick bob of his head, then, walking between the two of them, he placed a hand on each of their backs and led them back into the Garage. "Now, if I remember correctly, Stryker said that you two are filing in a single entry slot. Which, to put it simply, means you're sharing a Bone Buggy."

Tria groaned, tilting her head back exaggeratedly. "Ugh! I knew this was happening, but it still sucks!" A childish stomp followed by some pouting finished her round of complaining.

"It could be worse," her brother chimed in, "They could have rejected us from the Warden program from the get-go, and then we wouldn't have a Bone Buggy to share in the first place."

A couple of surprised blinks, followed by a snort. "I think I'd rather not have one at all if I have to share it with _you_."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means you're paranoid, dude."

* * *

**And so it begins... Whelp, all I can say is I know there's someone who has started a 'replay' type thing, too. And I'm going to say that I'll try my best to make it as different as possible. It'll be just like reading a completely different story. Which, I suppose, is already true to a certain extent...**

**Anyways, hopefully this is interesting enough for all of you great people out there. I'll actually work pretty hard to update this since I love this game to death, and with any luck that will include longer chapters for your enjoyment. :) **

**Leave me a review if you want, and maybe you can leave some pointers or something. Your feedback is definitely appreciated, though. Thanks for reading this, and have a wonderful day/night!**


	2. Babbles and Gingers

**Whew... Finally got this done. Darn schoolwork. And writer's block.**

* * *

"Jura! Go faster!"

"NO! We're already going too fast!"

"You're not even going 10 miles an hour!"

After a brief argument over who would be driving their Bone Buggy first, Jura had played the 'I'm older by seven minutes card' and claimed the right. Which, in hindsight, was probably not a good idea. He always had been overly cautious.

Tria grit her teeth, eye twitching slightly as she watched her brother manically switch between the brake and gas pedals. Even if he was trying to be careful, his gaze was all over the place and only on the road about fifty percent of the time, so he was still a hazard. Even Liu Ren, whose face was visible on a screen on the dashboard between the driver's and passenger's seat, looked nervous. And he wasn't even nearby.

Finally, fed up with his anxiousness, she reached over and grabbed a hold of the steering wheel, forcing herself into the driver's seat. Which was met with a surprising amount of opposition.

"No no no! _I'm _driving right now! You've gotta wait your turn, sis!" Jura shouted, attempting to shoulder her away. She pushed right back, easily overpowering him.

"Look, either you move, or I'll sit on your lap! And don't think I won't, because you know I will!" she replied, equally loud. Then, using her hand closest to the door, she pulled on the handle and pushed it open.

With one last shove, her brother was sent tumbling out of the Bone Buggy. He yelped, dazed as she slid into the seat and slammed the door, locking it. Smirking, Tria put on her seat belt and waited patiently for Jura to get back in.

Two clicks of the door later, he was huddled up next to her, arms and legs braced against the windows, floor, and upholstery. They sat in silence for a moment, both too caught up in themselves to really care about talking.

Liu Ren finally ended the silence. "Well, I suppose I should explain the controls for you this ti-"

"Don't need 'em! I listened earlier!" Tria grinned, slamming down the gas pedal. Tires ripped at the grass and dust from the dig site, and the Bone Buggy lurched forward. Jura squeaked and pressed himself harder against his seat.

Tria's mauve stare drifted from the road to the sparkling ocean beside them. She grinned, taking in the view contentedly. Her brother's squeals for her to look back at where they were going were all but ignored. After a minute of gaping, she faced forward and sped back up.

Garbled up sentences filled the air as a panic-struck Jura attempted to speak. Smug, Tria leaned back and relaxed, casually steering their vehicle up to what looked to be a large switch.

"Ah, I see you've found the switch to the gate," Liu Ren stated over Jura's babbling. "If you head in through there, you'll come across three different kinds of fossils. Choose wisely!"

"Why?"

"You have about ten minutes to work."

"What!?"

"Captain Stryker said the limit for each of your lessons was thirty minutes. You've already spent twenty getting this far."

"Oh. My. Gosh." The horn for the Bone Buggy blared obnoxiously as Tria slammed her head against it repeatedly. Her redheaded passenger cringed at each honk, and especially when she turned and glared at him.

"This wouldn't be happening if you'd just let me drive in the first place!"

"Bu-bu-! Puh-puh-puh! Bluh-!" Assorted babbling was the only response. Huffing, the blunette grumbled to herself and began to drive through the gap that had appeared upon hitting the switch.

"Gosh you're a pansy."

Scanning over the area before them, which consisted of a natural arch and a beach, Tria began to decide where she could go to scare Jura the most. The spot with a ramp leading up to a wall of rock appeared to be perfect for just that. There was water sloshing up its base, which probably made it slippery. Excellent.

Turning the wheel as far left as it would go, the car swerved as she drove at top speed down to the beach. The frightened screeches of her spiky haired sibling echoed through the Bone Buggy. She grinned mischievously.

Once they hit the water, it sloshed against the underside of the vehicle quite loudly, causing Jura to pale drastically. However, that was nothing compared to when they hit the ramp and, once they reached the top, were launched into the air briefly. He spoke his first full sentence since she had started driving.

"HOLY CRAP, WE'RE GONNA DIE!"

One bang later, they were atop a metal platform with railing on one side and stone on the other. And Jura was practically hyperventilating. Tria was too busy laughing at him to actually make sure he was alright.

After laughing for a good five minutes, she figured it would probably be a good idea to start digging up fossils, what with the time restraint and all. Scanning over the assorted buttons on dashboard, her gaze landed on one with a dinosaur skull illustrated on it. Pushing it down, a sharp ping sounded and an image lit up on the map beside the button.

Grinning, she elbowed her brother a couple of times. "Hey, I found a thing. You wanna clean it, or can I do it?"

A series of babbling came in reply. But, he appeared to be shaking his head 'no'. Oh well, his loss. With a shrug, she began to rotate the Bone Buggy, which involved accidentally backing into the railing and making Jura screech again. Even if it did dent the bumper, that made it worth it.

Liu Ren was happy to butt in again. "You're ready to start cleaning, correct?"

A small burst of excitement fluttered into her chest and she began to kick her legs out of anticipation. "You bet I am! Tell me what to do, man, I'm ready!"

"Right. Well, do you see those joysticks on either side of the steering wheel? Those control your hammer and drill. In order to see where the bone is, though, you're going to need to use the X-Ra-"

A flurry of bangs and whirrs interrupted him mid-sentence. With a sigh, Liu Ren leaned back in his chair. She marked the third candidate to cut him off. This was going to be a long day.

* * *

Tria flinched, eyes wide as a loud 'ding' interrupted her cleaning process. Her tools were now retracting, much to her confusion. No matter what she tried, they refused to keep digging.

"You ran out of time," Jura stated matter-of-factly, seeming to have calmed down while she was at work. Slightly annoyed by the smart remark, Tria turned and whacked his arm, to which he whined loudly.

"Quit crying, you baby," the blunette grumbled, mauve eyes looking back at the partially cleaned ribcage seated in the rock. Only now there was a small, silver thing floating next to it. That definitely was not there before.

Its pointed, robotic hands hovered over the fossils, almost like it was scanning it. After a moment, it turned towards Tria, black, empty 'x' shaped eyes staring at her. She flinched, unnerved at its rather creepy appearance.

Gaze locked on the robot, she began to nudge at Jura. "Hey, bro. I know I hit you like five seconds ago, but what the heck is that?"

He muttered something to himself, sending her a weak glare. "That's VR-00M. It's supposed to help us revive things and teach us how to fight properly. Weren't you listening to Liu Ren when he told us?"

"Listening to smart stuff is your job."

"Excavation complete! Specimen: Proto, Type: Body fossil, Score: 73!" VR-00M buzzed monotonously, bringing attention back to itself before floating over the top of the Bone Buggy and disappearing. "This is the first fossil you've seen from this vivosaur. Commencing revival!"

A strange, multicolored light shot from the top of their vehicle, engulfing the bones. Apparently the vivosaur was being revived. Tria grinned, legs kicking once again as she waited for the process to finish.

The light moved from the fossil, which was no longer embedded in the rock. It swirled around on the platform, slowly gaining mass and eventually shape. A final flash left a small, ginger orb in its wake.

With a click, Tria opened the door and peeked out. Pink met green as a small pair of eyes blinked open. Slowly, the creature uncurled, its stubby legs straightening out. It stood at about a foot tall at the shoulder, the frill on its head making it appear twice that height. Two yellow orbs were embedded in the crest, with similar ovals placed on its back and legs. A darker, heart-shaped spot sat between its eyes.

Without a second of hesitation, the female twin jumped out of the car and scooped up the small Ceratopsian. It squeaked, stunned by her sudden actions, and began to struggle. However, Tria's grip was too tight. She was much too enthralled by it to let it go that easily.

She turned towards her brother, who was staring blankly at her from within the Bone Buggy. "Look at it, Jura! Isn't it just the cutest little thing?"

"Yeah, something like that…" Jura chuckled lightly. Smiling, Tria climbed back into the front seat, Proto clutched to her chest, and sat back down. Seeing an opportunity, the creature jumped out of its owner's arms and sat down on the second human's lap.

"Aww, it likes you!" Tria grinned, patting the small vivosaur on the back. It cringed, but eventually accepted its fate and stopped squirming. "What should I call it?"

The redhead seemed surprised. "Why do you wanna name it?"

A shrug. "I dunno. Just seems fitting. What do you think, little guy?"

She locked gazes with the brightly colored vivosaur, laying against the upholstery so they were at eye level. Even if the Proto was shy, maybe doing that would help it warm up to her. Right…?

"Dusty? Will? Prince? Help me out here, buddy!"

"_Well, for starters, I'm a girl…" _A soft, feminine voice murmured. Tria blinked a couple of times, the reply taking a few seconds to properly register in her brain. Then she froze up.

It answered. The Proto answered.

Despite her shock, Tria found herself stuck in a staring contest with the small Vivosaur. There was no way she heard that. Obviously her excitement was just making her hear things.

"_Um… Why are you staring at me?"_

Or not.

She couldn't control herself any longer. "WHY ARE YOU TALKING!?"

Jura shot her a perplexed look. "I didn't say any-"

"Not you!" An accusing finger was aimed at the ginger reptile. "_HER!_"

The shamrock eyed Proto flinched, climbing backwards over Jura's legs. Its small figure trembled as it attempted to shrink out of sight.

Her brother rolled his eyes, shocking her. "Sis, how the heck did you make it this far in the Warden choosing process if you don't know anything about vivosaurs?"

She cast a nervous glance to the side, laughing awkwardly. "I, uh, cheated off of your homework. And tests. And everything, really."

"...And you wonder why they're making us go through the program as a single entry."

"Just tell me why I can hear that Proto talking!"

With a frustrated sigh, he picked up the small quadruped and handed her to Tria. She took the small creature gently and tried to hold her in a more comfortable position than earlier. A smile twitched to her face as she felt her relax. That was good.

Her happiness faded when she noticed the expression Jura was getting. His 'listen to my wise words, ignorant sister' look. "It has something to do with the revival process. They talked about it a little bit in one of the lectures in-"

Unfortunately for him, she had no interest in feeling stupid at that moment. The only thing she needed to know was that it was normal to hear vivosaurs. With a loud 'Pft', she cut him off and refocused on her Proto.

"So, a pretty name for a pretty girl… How about Maisy?" She looked to the small Earth vivosaur, grinning in hopes of winning her over. After a moment of silence, the reptile nodded slowly. A jolt of joy hit her chest. "Awesome! Now, hows about we get you a friend?"

The shrill ringing of the Bone Buggy communicator filled the vehicle, and Liu Ren's face appeared in place of the map. Tria groaned, realizing why he was calling them. They'd ran out of time.

"Lemme guess, time to head in?" the blunette asked, hoping to move things along. The man nodded, appearing apologetic.

"I'm afraid so," he sighed, head hanging slightly. "I've tried to buy you more time, but because of the way the lessons overlap, the next candidate has been waiting for ten minutes."

She couldn't deny that it would be horrible to wait that long to dig up fossils. It had almost killed her to go the twenty it took Jura to fail at driving. Frustrated, she flopped back against the seat. There was only one option at this point - begging.

Beaming, Tria attempted to put on her most agreeable expression. "Would it be possible for me to dig up one more fossil? _Please_? Because Jura took so long?" She clasped her hands in front of her chest for emphasis, blinking rapidly.

Her appeal seemed to have worked, because Liu Ren cringed and appeared conflicted. After a second of thought, he exhaled loudly, shoulders sagging. "...Alright, one more fossil. Just get back as fast as you can after that."

Without hesitation, Tria squealed out a loud "THANK YOU!", hung up on her instructor, and slammed down the gas pedal. Their car lurched forward, her brother screeching out of being startled and horrified simultaneously. Down the ramp and, thanks to a ping on the sonar, taking a very sharp right, the Proto, now dubbed Maisy, was sent tumbling over laps and machinery.

The brakes were applied forcefully, and they stopped so suddenly that Maisy was draped across the dashboard, Jura was, once again, in a state of shallow breathing, and Tria was enjoying the adrenaline rush. Exhilarated, she whacked the X-Ray button, the green silhouette of a frilled skull appearing in the rock. She smirked, grabbing the twin joysticks forcefully.

"I think this is a Proto skull!" Tria shouted over the cracking and whirring of the hammer and drill. She turned to her shivering brother, trying to look sorry for him but feeling no actual remorse. "Guess we'll have to come back later and get you a vivo, huh!?"

The sound of snapping bones brought her back to the fossil, which Maisy was watching with great intent. She must have been thinking about having that added to her. Tria felt her attention shift again, the Proto taking over her thoughts. That had to be a weird feeling. Knowing those bones were going to be put in you.

Dinging went off again, tools retracted, and VR-00M floated in from wherever it had been. Scanning the fossil, it announced the information loudly.

"Excavation complete! Specimen: Proto, Type: Head fossil, Score: 85!"

The robot, instead of vanishing again, floated over to Jura's side of the Bone Buggy and tapped on the window. He promptly rolled it down, allowing it to put its arm inside. Its sharp fingers spread apart as it reached towards Maisy.

The ginger reptile suddenly flashed down to a small, yellow disc with a cartoonish version of herself etched on the center. VR-00M picked it up, retreating to the roof of the vehicle. A few clunks and whirrs later, information on the Proto filled the dashboard monitor. Apparently she was rank three and had two attacks. Neat.

After switching the monitor back to the dig site map, which took some instructing from Jura to accomplish, Tria began to head back towards the Park. Unlike earlier, she was done tormenting her brother for being a huge baby about driving, so the Bone Buggy drove along at a slower rate than before. He appeared to be relaxing now.

Just as they exited the gate, a flash of red entered Tria's peripheral. Turning to see what it was, since the shade was different than her brother's hair, she flinched upon spotting a vivosaur charging straight at them. Before either of them could react, it had slammed into their Bone Buggy, rocking it back and forth quite violently.

Once again, Liu Ren seemed to pop in at the most convenient time. "I see you're having rogue vivosaur problems."

The red and green creature that had attacked them pressed its snout against the windshield, its hot breath fogging it up. Wild, gold eyes glared in at them. Tria shuddered, slightly intimidated.

"I don't know what you're talking about," she answered sarcastically, rolling her eyes. Sarcasm was always the answer to a problem, after all. "Obviously this guy just wants to be our friend."

Whether or not their instructor was amused by her quip, he kept a serious attitude about their situation. "Even so, it's a Warden's duty to capture rogues so that they can't escape the Park and attack civilians." He paused, seemingly unsure about what to do next.

"I suppose you'll just have to fight it," he sighed, face scrunching up out of frustration. "This was bound to happen sooner or later. Just send out your Proto and I'll help you from there."

"Right. I'll do that in a sec…" Tria muttered, scrutinizing the dashboard for the proper button to do said task. The rogue slashed at the side of the Bone Buggy, the slicing noise making Tria cringe and lose track of what she was doing. Slightly frantic now that danger was evident, Jura reached over and pointed at the screen, which displayed an image of Maisy.

"It's right there, Tria! For pete's sake, look!"

Her hand slammed against the image, and with a booming sound a ginger ball slammed into the feathered rogue's side. The long-clawed brute backed away, snarling as it spotted its opponent. Maisy let out a squeak which, combined with her being a fourth the size of the brightly colored vivosaur, only made the creature snort in reply.

"Now, your vivosaur is faster, so you get to attack first," Liu Ren explained, fully capturing Tria's attention. She had to admit, it took a lot to get her to listen to someone. "A list of your Proto's attacks should appear on the monitor of your Bone Buggy."

Sure enough, two panels popped up on the screen. One read 'Dome Dash' and the other 'Spin Drop'. After checking each of their attack powers, she decided that Spin Drop was the way to go.

She rolled down the window, leaning out of it to get a better view of her vivosaur. "Alright, Maisy! Use Spin Drop!"

The quadruped crouched briefly, legs tensing. She leaped forward, spinning and slamming into the rogue. Upon colliding with her opponents back, Maisy shoved off and landed on the ground gracefully. Her enemy was now in a hunched over, slightly painful-looking position.

However, its posture corrected as it prepared its attack. Golden claws shimmered in the sunlight as they were raised above the larger vivosaur's head. Then, snarling, it slashed at Maisy, sending her flying into the Bone Buggy. Her sharp, tiny nails dug into the hood, allowing her to avoid hitting the windshield.

A couple of bounds later, the Proto was back on the ground, red scratches on her side. She was still combat-ready, though. Just a little bit winded was all.

"Okay, your vivosaur has lost some health now," the ever-helpful Liu Ren piped in, "But there's nothing wrong with that. You can just use your Support Shots."

"Ooo, I know what those are!" Jura exclaimed, probably trying to prove his worth. He pointed to a small panel just underneath the monitor, which consisted of four buttons, two of which had text on them. The top one had 'Atk' inscribed on it, and the left one read 'LP'. "You shoot them to your vivosaurs during battle. Looks like we have LP Recovery and Attack Up."

Their instructor seemed impressed. "You know quite a bit about how these things work for a beginner."

"Well, of course. I like knowing stuff," the redhead beamed, crossing his arms smugly. Tria rolled her eyes, leaning back out the window.

"Whatever. Just spam those things and whatnot while I take care of this," she grinned. "Alright, one more Spin Drop, Maisy!"

There was a slight dinging noise from inside the Bone Buggy, followed by something that resembled electricity sparking over the Proto. She sprung forward, corkscrewing and crashing into her plumed adversary with much more ferocity than before. That must have been from the Attack Ups.

The red and green vivosaur staggered back, collapsing to the ground and reverting down to a small rust colored disc. Maisy landed shortly afterward, head held high upon seeing how well she had done. She also transformed back into a disc. Seconds later, VR-00M floated out from wherever it stayed and picked up both of them.

"Excellent job, you two," Liu Ren smiled, though his cheerfulness was short lived. His frustration resurfaced as he remembered what they were supposed to be doing. "Now hurry back so that the next candidate can start digging, and so VR-00M can give me the Dino Gear of that Alxas."

"Yeah, yeah. We'll be there is a sec," Tria replied, putting the window back up and resettling in her seat. She glanced over to her brother, pausing once she noticed his crestfallen expression.

"...We'll come back later, Jura, sheesh. You'll get your vivosaur eventually."

An annoyed snort. "Actually, I just wanted to drive."

The blunette rolled her eyes, slamming down the gas pedal and smirking when her redheaded passenger squealed. She slowed down a few moments later, taking in his panic smugly.

"Man, you're whiny."

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**Whew... I'm not sure why this took me so long. I'll try harder to get the next chapter done. I promise. XD Lots of effort will be exerted.**

**And this should have been longer, buuuut I wasn't sure about where to end it, and writer's block has been slaying me, so I thought it would be best to stick with this. I'll try to make the next one a little longer to compensate. ;)**


	3. Goggles and Smarties

**Man, we're already over 200 views... Thanks, guys! Hope the wait for this chapter wasn't too bad... Heh... Heh...**

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Tennis shoes snapped against pavement as Jura shot out of the Bone Buggy garage as fast as he possibly could. No more of Tria's driving for him. Or at least, for that day. She'd probably force him into that passenger seat soon enough.

Once he had reached the HQ, he leaned against the building, beside the doors, to catch his breath. And maybe wait for his sister. She would get pretty mad if he ditched her.

Looking up from his feet, Jura's gaze scanned the general area of the Garage. He had been expecting something blue and pink, but instead a large, green blur was rolling towards him. Blinking a couple of times, the redhead stepped away from the wall in order to get a better look at what was coming his way.

"Somebody! Anybody! HAAAAAAAALP!"

Wait, was that the blur-

WHAM!

Groaning, Jura shakily began to get off the ground. Whatever that thing was, it had taken him out pretty easily. He checked himself over for wounds. One of his elbows was scraped. Fantastic.

Curiosity led him to turn around and investigate what had led to his injury. To his surprise, the plump kid in the green sweatshirt from the Warden meeting thing was scrambling up to his feet. He was smiling, though there was a hint of apologeticness in his eyes.

"Oh, thank you so much!" he beamed, brushing off his clothing. "I was afraid I was going to roll forever!"

Trying to be friendly, Jura shot him a grin. His teeth were clenched, though, as he clutched at his bleeding elbow, so he actually looked sort of mad. "N-no problem. Though I think that the HQ building would have stopped you just as well."

The brunet paused, seemingly thinking over Jura's reply. "I guess you're right. But that would have hurt so much more." A shrug, followed by a huge grin. "Oh well, too late for that!"

"I suppose…"

Light blue eyes suddenly lit up with recognition. "Say, you're Jura, right? And your sister is Tria?"

"That's right," Jura nodded, impressed. He never had been great with names. "And you are…?"

"Roland," the other teen finished happily. At least he was not upset with him. In fact, he seemed as gleeful as ever. "Thanks again, Jura! Guess I'll see you later."

He waved, turning and walking into the HQ building. As soon as the doors closed, Jura broke out in a fit of whimpers and removed his gloved hand from his elbow. The bleeding appeared to be slowing down, but it still needed bandaging. That was the one thing he had forgotten to bring with him…

The clapping of rubber on pavement broke his concentration on his injury. Green eyes met mauve as Jura glanced up from his elbow to see Tria standing next to him. She had taken notice of his clouded eyes.

An obvious smirk. "Aww, did wittle Jura get a boo boo?"

"Sh-shut up, Tria! It hurts like heck!" His eyes narrowed as he tried to keep his voice from shaking. It would be completely and utterly horrible if his sister of all people found out he was close to tears.

Luckily, she seemed willing to drop the matter. Grabbing the wrist of his uninjured arm, Tria began dragging him into the building. They had barely made it in before someone else stopped them.

Bright blue eyes and vibrant pink hair. That was, unmistakably, the boy that had been running late. He appeared to have calmed since then.

Goggles bounced around his neck as he jogged up to them. "Hey, Jura and Tria!" Heels dug into the metal floor as he slid to a stop seconds before colliding with the twins. "Wait - you guys are Jura and Tria, right? Because I thought that one guy with the purple hair was named Roland, and he really chewed me out since that wasn't his name and…"

His voice simply faded out as he seemed to stop for breath. Jura smiled weakly, stepping up next to his sister. "Yes, that's us. Not that I'd be all that offended if you messed up my name." The redhead broke out in titters, rubbing the back of his neck. "Heck, I can't really remember your name either."

"Oh! Well, thanks for understanding," the pink haired teen grinned. "And my name's Nate, for future reference. Just thought that, as fellow stragglers, we could be good buddies!"

_"Well, I wanted to be punctual,"_ the taller male thought, casting a begrudging glance to his sister. She either failed to notice or just ignored him. It was probably the latter.

Beaming, Tria shot Nate a thumbs-up. "Heck yeah, the lag buddies! Sounds great to me!" The two high-fived, turning back to Jura after doing so.

"Now that we've got that settled, you two wanna explore HQ with me?" He gestured behind himself, jumping from foot to foot ever-so-slightly. "There's this really reeeaallly cool room I found! I wanna go check it out so bad!"

"You can count me in!" Tria exclaimed, now appearing just as excited as Nate. Mauve eyes exploding with energy, she looked over to Jura. "How about you, bro? Wanna come?"

The spiky haired teen cringed. He hated being put on the spot like that. Especially when it came to making questionable choices.

"I… Uh… Are you sure we're allowed back there?"

A loud 'pft' from his small sister.

"Who cares? Besides, if they didn't want us back there, there'd be a sign or something."

Jura shifted his feet anxiously, Tria's input failing to calm his nerves. This just screamed bad idea. Well, pretty much anything she came up with was a bad idea, but this one was especially bad.

The blunette snorted, gaze flickering back to Nate. "Let's just go without him. He's a deadweight, anyways."

Exchanging mischievous looks, the two lively teens darted off to the room Nate had referred to. Jura's hand reached out to them weakly. There was that darn urge to follow them. He was supposed to be the responsible one, after all.

His brotherly instincts got the best of him. "H-hey, wait for me!" Footsteps resonated through the lobby as the redhead clumsily jogged after them, hand still grasping his elbow. Upon catching up with the duo, his sister smirked.

"I knew you'd follow us," she snickered, shoving him playfully. On his injured arm. Ow.

"Hey, the more the merrier!" Nate grinned, patting Jura on the back. He was definitely stronger than he looked. Ow again. "Anyways, let's get going!"

The three of them filed into the 'interesting room', their pink haired friend in the lead. On the left, three large tubes rose from the floor to the ceiling, one filled with pink colored energy, one with blue, and one with green. Beside them were what looked to be prototypes for Bone Buggy attachments. On the right, there where two doors, one clearly shut tight but without an obvious means of opening it, and the other open and displaying an elongated hallway. Jura had to admit it; it was a pretty interesting room.

Tria seemed equally enthralled. She darted from place to place, taking everything in as fast as she could. "This place is… AWESOME!"

"Yeah. Really science-y," Jura agreed, beginning to move around as well. Suddenly the thought to come back at a later time seemed like a great idea. He could dork out over it in solitude.

Their companion grinned, pulling at his goggles slightly. "I know, right? This place is great!" He paused, leaning in towards Jura dramatically, then whispered, "This must be where the Wardens make all their secret weapons and junk."

"I doubt it," the taller male sighed, rolling his eyes. "Those would be in a much more secure location. Trust me."

The whirr of the door opening filled the lab, and the three intruders spun around to see a rather small boy with light green hair, who looked to be around ten, step inside. He was wearing a labcoat meant for a much larger adult, so it hung over his frame quite loosely. Under the coat was a tan shirt tucked into his tan shorts, and a red bolo tie around his neck. Black kneesocks with bright green and white tennis shoes covered his feet.

He seemed surprised, but not upset in the slightest. In fact, he looked delighted. Lab coat tangling with his legs, the boy strode up to them with a grin plastered to his face.

"Hello! Welcome, Jura, Tria, and Nate!" His silver eyes shone with a childish giddiness as he spoke. "I hope my laboratory was as enthralling for you as it is for me."

"Woah, woah, woah," Tria butted in, walking up next to Jura and resting her elbow on his shoulder, "You know us?"

"Indubitably!" the boy practically sang in reply, "In fact, I know quite a bit about all of you candidates." His grey gaze floated to Jura's arm as he finished his statement. The hat wearing teen stared, a bit stunned as the kid began to examine his skinned elbow. Letting go of his arm, the boy headed over to a cupboard and began rummaging through it.

Finally the question of the hour was voiced by Nate. "Wait, who exactly are you?"

The boy in question emerged from his search, a small bandage in his hand. "I'm Professor Little, a researcher of fossil energy." He stopped for a moment, carefully placing the bandage over Jura's wound. "I also do a bit of medical work on the side, but most of my time is dedicated to fossils and whatnot."

"That's cool." Green eyes curiously examined the now covered wound as he murmured the mindless reply. However, the young professor failed to notice the lack of enthusiasm. He beamed, hands clasping in front of his chest.

"Superb! Then I can finally talk about my invention with someone!"

Prof. Little strode over to the luminescent tubes, fondly running a hand over the pink one. "Now then! This, my new friends, is a compact fossil-energy materialization device." He glanced back at the three teens behind him, sighing after taking in their blank expressions. "In layman's terms, it's a miniature revival machine."

"That's miniature?" Tria quipped, joining the boy in front of his machine. Her twin couldn't help but let out a snigger. She really did know very little about scientific technology.

The green haired boy shared his amusement, judging by the giggles. "You should have seen the original machine. It was approximately the size of this room, maybe a little bigger." Arms stretched out to emphasize his point. "Quite similar to those old computers, actually, in design and development."

Nodding, the only female appeared to accept his point. _"At least she knew when to give up,"_ Jura mused to himself, _"Normally she's way more bullheaded."_

Little's face fell suddenly, his posture drooping. "However, its compactness made it so less data can be stored in it. I've had to reconfigure quite a bit on it just so it could hold the revival protocols for the 75 vivosaurs commonly used in Fossil Parks Asia, America, and Europe." Hands began gesturing in circles as he tried to figure out how to phrase his explanation for those of simpler mindsets.

"You guys only have 75 different vivos between the three parks?" Nate snorted, crossing his arms. Hadn't he been listening? Compact equipment meant less vivosaurs. "Not to be rude, but Caliosteo has at least twice that many. And I know Vivosaur Island definitely has more than 75."

A frustrated sigh. "Yes, well, the compacted equipment is a bit hard to work with. We have to use the most basic programs to take up less space, so that limits revivals to reptilian creatures, then there's the fact that you cannot drive a Bone Buggy underwater..." Pausing, the boy's face scrunched up out of frustration. "And don't even get me started on all the copyright 'infringements'. Honestly, you would think the Richmond Foundation would be more willing to let Fossil Fighting expand, but nooo, they might lose a bit of profit if we recreate their vivosaurs in other parts of the world."

"...Sounds complicated," Jura empathized, patting the small professor on the back. The silver eyed boy exhaled loudly, casting a grateful glance in his direction.

"It really is," the small male replied, his excitement returning after a moment of thought. "But on the brightside, I've been working out some numbers that should let us begin reviving ancient mammals and aquatic reptiles within the next decade! Soon, Bone Buggies all across the world will be bringing to life powerful beasts like the Andrewsarchus or Kronosaurus!"

A rather immature form of joy overtook Prof. Little suddenly, and he broke out in a stream of pure scientific babbling. Equations and theories and the occasional mention of fossil power spewed from his mouth, which seemed like nonsense since he did not explain any of them, only what they had to do with each other.

"-so even though the smaller size which works for Bone Buggies has been impractical, when taking into account the data storage formula of-" Sharp dings erupted from one of the monitors near the back of the lab, causing the three teens to jump and the rambling professor to let out a childish whine. Trudging to the monitor, he tapped a few things on the screen.

He turned to his guests, disappointment evident. "Well, shoot. It seems Stryker needs my assistance with something. And just when I was getting to the best part…" Shoes scraped awkwardly across the metal floor. "You'll have to excuse me, friends. Hopefully I can finish telling you about this wonderful development soon enough."

With an apologetic smile, Little weaved through the small group and rushed out the door. Once its gentle hum had stopped, Nate let out an exasperated groan. He sat down on the Little-sized desk, hands resting on its surface to balance himself.

"Yeesh! I thought my head was gonna blow up there for a second!" the pink haired teen moaned, tilting his head back for emphasis. "My brain's been turned to mush! Err, that sounds kinda gross. So, it got turned to pudding... See!? That was all the proof you need!"

"The man makes a very convincing point," Tria agreed, head bobbing to show this. Jura rolled his eyes, a bit annoyed by their ignorance.

"Honestly, all you had to do was listen carefully. It wasn't too hard to follow," the redhead stated matter-of-factly. Judging by the indifferent expressions coming from the other two teens, they were both on the 'what is listening?' boat. Hooray.

Hands slid to the edge of the desk as Nate began to slide off. "Right, well, let's get out of here before that kid comes back and gives us a test or something." He froze mid-dismount, fingers groping at the underside of the furniture. Finally reaching the floor, the blue clad teen crouched down, examining the area he had touched.

"Nate, what are you doing?" Jura inquired nervously. He hadn't even known the guy for a day, and already he could tell when he was getting into bad things. Maybe that was because he was so much like Tria…

"There's a weird little button on the bottom of this desk!" he announced, jumping back up to his feet. Mischief shone in his eyes. "Should I push it? I'm gonna push it."

"Do iiiiiit!"

"Tria, don't encoura-"

"I pushed it."

"Oh my freaking-"

With a high-pitched zing!, the seemingly unopenable door beside the desk slid open. Tria and Nate immediately shot over to it, mystified. Each peeked in from either doorframe, equally intrigued.

"Oh my gosh!" Nate squealed, his goggles bouncing around his neck as he did some kind of happy dance. "I just opened a hidden chamber! Or a secret passage! Or whatever! But it's still AWESOME!"

Well, now Jura was certain letting his new friend go into there would probably be a huge mistake. Deciding to be the responsible one yet again, the teen strode up to the doorway and blocked it just by standing there. He clipped his hat firmly around his chin to signify just how serious he was.

His sister was, of course, the first to complain. "Aww, come on, Jura! I bet that Little guy keeps all the cool stuff in there!" And she was the first to physically assault him, too. Luckily, she was just pushing him. Nothing he couldn't handle.

"Yeah!" the slightly shorter male chimed in, but didn't actually join in on attacking him. "I mean, think of all the cool laser guns we could be missing out on!"

"No, no, no, nonono!" He knocked Tria's hands away, glowering at her sternly. They really were not trying all that hard. Nate wasn't even helping her- wait a minute.

Said person suddenly shoved past him, laughing victoriously as he slid to a stop within the secret room. Jura spun around, about to chew his friend out when another body slipped past him. The two smaller teens high-fived, smirking at him.

"Get out of there!" Jura hissed, leaning through the door frame but not moving his feet. His sister responded by sticking her tongue out tauntingly. That was mature.

And now Nate was hovering over some machine in the back. This was going downhill fast. "Hey guys, any idea what this is?" he inquired, fingers prodding at buttons randomly. Cringing, the redhead darted in and smacked his hands away.

"Don't just touch stuff! Who knows what this does?" the eldest scolded, making sure to push the goggle-clad teen a few feet away from the tech. Blue eyes narrowed, their owner becoming mildly irritated.

"Sheesh, stop taking yourself so seriously, Jura," Tria sniggered, placing a hand on the strange equipment as she leaned back. A series of alarms went off, causing the two boys to turn and watch her awkwardly lift a gloved hand from a monitor. "Whoops…"

Shoes smacked against the floor angrily. "This is exactly why I didn't want to come in here!" her brother shouted over the blaring noise, a harsh glower over his countenance. The blunette shrugged, appearing indifferent to the situation.

"Well, it's too late now."

"That doesn't make it any better!"

"Hey guys, I think the machine is doing something," Nate interrupted, pointing at said machine. Steam began to pour out between a crimson seal and the copper colored box it covered. A sizzling akin to opening a pop bottle filled the air.

Crapcrapcrapcrapcrap. They were going to be in so much trouble. At least the alarms had stopped going off. Maybe they could cover this up fairly easily.

Gears creaked, springs loosened, and finally with a slight pop!, the metal seal unhinged. Beneath it, in a padded cavity that vaguely resembled the inside of a coffin, a very small vivosaur lay. It appeared to be dead, hence the casket look of its dwellings, until big, green eyes groggily blinked away.

Long, white nails dug into its cloth confines, and the small biped hopped out on to the metal floor. It paused, taking a moment to scratch at its head with a foot. The three teens stared at it, all equally surprised.

Jura was especially intrigued by it. For one, its mainly red body was of a similar shade to his hair, not to mention the matching eye color. Even its bushy blue eyebrows reminded him of his hat. At least the 'x' shaped scar on its snout and assorted green stripes defined it from him. Oh, and the scales. And also the fact that it was a vivosaur.

"Hey Jura, it kinda looks like you," Tria snickered, earning a glare from her brother. Even if he did agree with her, he would never admit to looking like whatever that thing was.

"Truer words have never been spoken," Nate agreed, frowning, "I mean, they're both a huge disappointment."

The two broke out in laughter, all seriousness forgotten. Jura grumbled a few unpleasant words under his breath, not incredibly fond of being made fun of. Not to mention that they had just accidentally released some creature. Now was not the time for goofing off.

However, the blue clothed teen seemed to think otherwise. Seeing how successful his previous joke had been, it appeared he was going to keep up with his antics. Fantastic.

"Hey! Hey, vivosaur! Check it out!" The bright red reptile turned towards Nate, blinking absently upon seeing that it was staring at the boy's rear. Said male giggled, smacking the seat of his pants to enhance his taunt. "You're the butt of the joke, get it?"

Despite his sister's chortles at Nate's joke, Jura still found himself glaring, unamused. Again, the vivosaur was a problem they needed to take care of. Plus he was being super immature. Mostly the latter at that point.

The vivosaur gave off the impression of agreeing with the redhead all of a sudden. Its blank expression turned to rage, and a high-pitched roar exited its maw. Its aggravator cringed, a nervous look creeping over his face.

"Huh, maybe he doesn't like my joke as much as I-"

Lunging forward, teeth with sharpness akin to those of a puppy's snapped shut around Nate's hindquarters. He yelped, face-planting and shouting as he attempted to pry the vivosaur off. All the while, Tria had fallen into near hysterical laughter, her brother fighting back the occasional snigger.

"This isn't funny!" Nate whined, too afraid to actually look at his attacker. "Call the paramedics! Call the police! Call a lawyer! Call somebody!" He stopped his pleas, redirecting them in vain. "Please don't eat my butt, Mr. Vivosaur! I need it for sitting in chairs and stuff!"

Finally, the crimson biped unlatched from its prey, letting out one final cry of fury before dashing out of the room. Jura cringed, watching it leave with wide eyes. It was getting away. Oh no. Oh no no no no no.

A cracking, whimper of a voice interrupted the redhead's minor panic attack. "Tell it to me straight, guys… Is my butt still there?"

Fighting back laughter, Tria answered to the best of her ability. "Nope, that little bugger gulped it right up."

"Noooo! My poor butt! It's just vivosaur chow now!"

"Sucks to be you."

Hands cautiously reached back to touch the injured area. Upon feeling nothing out of the ordinary, the pink haired teen looked back. Seeing that his rear was basically intact, he stood up, brushing himself off in an attempt to hide his embarrassment.

"You really shouldn't lie to people about their cans like that. It's super impolite, you know," he grumbled, trying to suppress the reddening of his face. While Jura normally would have felt bad for him, considering that they had just let some random creature get out, now was not the time to feel sorry for screw-ups.

"Both of you, focus!" the spiky haired teen snapped, his paranoia getting the best of him. Once the two were gazing at him, the chewing out continued. "We've got bigger problems to deal with than Nate's butt!"

That seemed to capture their attention. "Th-that's right!" Nate chimed in, real panic seeming to settle in. "If people find out about this, we're sure to be disqualified from becoming Wardens!"

"...Craaaaaaap!" Tria sang, joining in on the 'serious' party. "I actually wanted to be one, too!"

"C'mon, we've gotta find that little devil ASAP!"

The energetic duo shot off, leaving Jura to sigh and leisurely jog after them. Even if he was worried about getting caught, Nate and Tria had worn him out far too much for it to act as motivation. He just needed a moment away from those two, then finding that vivosaur wouldn't be so bad.

Besides, they would have probably caught it by the time he had caught up...

* * *

**Okay, that's done, hooray hooray, now to the fun stuff.**

**So I've been think that, since I get out of school in less than a month, once summer hits I might try out working on this and 'A Change of Pace'. Again, not making any promises since I don't actually know how busy I'll be, or how lazy for that matter, buuuut I might as well give it a whirl. So I guess we'll see.**


	4. Carnivores and Dental Problems

"_C'mon, c'mon… Where'd he run off to?"_

Mauve eyes scrutinized the HQ lobby for red scales. So far, there was only silver flooring and the occasional decorative sago palm. Nothing out of the ordinary, and definitely nothing red. Which meant that the little bugger had probably gotten outside.

Slipping behind one of the ornamental palms in order to avoid being spotted, Tria dashed out the front door and out on to black pavement. The sun felt nice, and the air sure was fresh. She began to zone out, enjoying the refreshing breeze.

"No, gotta focus!" the blunette snapped, flicking herself on the side of the head a few times to get out of her daze. Grinning, she looked to the right, then the left. Was that a bit of fleeting red...?

Sure enough, seated beneath the shade of the robotic dinosaur, was the escapee. It was languidly scratching its head with a foot, seemingly unaware that its arms were long enough to itch it as well. But that was fine. That way, the small vivosaur couldn't see her sneaking up on it.

Giving her bow a few tugs for good luck, Tria began to creep up on the unsuspecting reptile. Light steps, long strides, breath held; everything was going well. She was hardly making a sound.

Finally, the vivosaur was within arm's reach. Carefully shifting her weight forward, the pink clad teen leaned in, hands extending out as far as possible. Just a little more-

"Hey! Tria! Did you see him? You saw him, right?"

Star-shaped pupils met mauve as the reptile spun around to see who had spoken. Letting out a startled growl, the biped took off running. It shot under the railing and past the Garage, disappearing down the trail to the dig site. Tria let out a snarl of her own, kicking at the air for a moment.

Teeth clenched, she turned to her exuberant friend. "Nate! I almost had him!" Hands gestured in the direction her target had darted off in. "Now he's _probably gone_ to some dig site, and we'll _probably_ have to go after him!"

"Well, aren't you positive?" Nate quipped, glancing off to the side. As much as it hurt for her to think it, now was not the time for sarcasm. And that was saying something.

Eyes awkwardly scanned behind her friend for a certain puff of red hair. "Whatever... Where's Jura?"

"I think he's lagging. Again."

"We don't have time for lagging!"

A groan, followed by frustrated stomping. "Look, I'll go find him. Go after that vivosaur for now," Tria instructed, pointing towards the Garage for emphasis. She made sure to glare in order to get her point across.

And Nate was cringing, which meant said point was across and then some. "G-got it!" His parting salute was a nice touch. That was thoroughly enjoyed.

He bolted off past her, shouting to the staff member at the Garage about getting his Bone Buggy out as he went. Well, Nate was taking care of that. Now she was feeling a lot less stressed. There was only the remaining issue of finding Jura to take care of.

The automatic door whizzed open, Tria popping in her head and scrutinizing the lobby. Sure enough, there was her good-for-nothing brother chatting with that blonde chick. Like he was going to stay there while they chased after that vivosaur.

But, there was no time for subtlety. With a loud, "LET'S GO, BRO!" Tria darted in, grabbed the spiky haired teen by the wrist, and exited just as quickly as she had entered.

And he was whining already. "Oh, come on! I had nothing to do with this problem!" Heels dug into pavement, and the duo slowed drastically. Tria was set on going to their Bone Buggy, though, so she was still trying to move forward despite the opposing force.

"You're a witness!" She snapped back, teeth grit as she began pulling harder. Since when had he been strong enough to avoid getting pulled around?

"But I'm not an accomplice!" A yank backwards almost made the smaller twin lose her balance. Alright, that was getting annoying fast.

"Too bad!" With one final exertion, Tria managed to get her brother off balance. He staggered forward, barely managing to stop himself from tripping. A green glare was sent back to her.

Grouchily getting back up, the redhead dusted himself off awkwardly. "Yeah, whatever. They'd probably tag us together on this problem, anyways…"

"That's the spirit!" his sister grinned, giving him a pat on the back. Which almost knocked him over in the process. Eh, he had it coming.

* * *

Jura's pathetic whimpers were significantly more calming than one would think. At least, to Tria they were. Leaning back in her seat, hands loosely positioned on the steering wheel, the blunette reveled in his panicking as she drove their Bone Buggy over the grassy terrain of Paradise Beach.

They had just passed the area where Maisy had been unearthed when Nate's call came in. His awkward, nervous face popped up on the sonar screen, a hint of distress to his expression. That couldn't be good.

"Well, I almost had him, but that son of a gun managed to get past the main gate since it was busted up…" A slight titter finished off the rather unhelpful comment.

"So you're saying he got away," Tria replied flatly, a hint of a growl in her tone. A responding weak nod drew out a groan. "Well that's just great."

Blue eyes flickered away from the monitor suddenly, seemingly doubling in size. "Er, hold on! I see 'em now!"

Yes. Good. Something was finally happening. Grinning, Tria tightened her grip on the wheel and prepared to speed up.

"Alright, according to the map, he's in East Hollows." A few clicks and apprehensive humming filled in the silence of her pink haired friend figuring out controls. "So I… _think _I just sent you the coordinates. Not exactly sure, though. Liu Ren didn't.. really… cover that…"

And since he most likely had no clue what he was doing... "So, is East Hollows just after that area we all dug fossils at?"

"Yep! You could probably just drive until you see me, actually."

"That I can do."

Casting a mischievous grin to her brother, who squeaked and braced himself against any hard surface possible, Tria slammed on the gas pedal. The vehicle lurched forward, speeding along between walls of rock. Each curve was taken at full speed, throwing the passengers to and fro (Jura more so, of course).

Eventually Nate's lighter, better blue colored car came into view, which led to the adrenaline-filled teen smashing down the brake much harder than need be. Wheels screeched and tore up grass until finally, with more rattling of the twins, the Buggy came to a reluctant stop.

Laughter came over the intercom. "Sheesh! You sure know how to make an entry!" Nate's grinning face seemed to have all but forgotten their current predicament. But, he did manage to appear serious once he and Tria had finished laughing.

"Alright, focusing now. That little vivo's up there, see?"

Sure enough, there was that red and white little bugger. He seemed to be trotting around aimlessly, sniffing at random patches of grass and scratching his head. Huh. Didn't seem all that bright, really. It was a wonder the thing had escaped them earlier. Then again, Nate _was _helping them…

A smirk twitched across the mauve eyed teen's face. "Awesome. We can just drive up a little closer, then Jura can hop out and nab him."

"W-wait, why d-do I have t-to do it?" the redhead whimpered, slowly composing himself after their epic ride. Seriously, he needed to toughen up. Her driving skills were on point.

"Because, you've just sat here and done nothing the entire time," Tria quipped, sass dripping from her words as she began to creep their vehicle forward. She could already feel his green gaze boring into the side of her head.

A firm, enraged shout blasted from the passenger seat. "I DIDN'T LET THAT THING OUT!"

"Too bad!" The Bone Buggy stopped. "Now get out, grab that vivosaur, and for the love of all things holy, don't make a lot of noise!"

Glaring at her brother steadily, the blunette stayed stiff as a plank, waiting impatiently for her twin to cave. About ten seconds later, Jura was grumbling to himself while fiddling his seat-belt off. The door clicked, and he slipped out, making sure to leave it open as he tiptoed out.

His spiky hair was the first thing visible over the hood. Which was actually really funny to look at, but also a distraction. It was most definitely time to focus. Soon the bandanna clad boy crept out into the open, just a few feet away from that vivosaur. Everything was going well. They could get that thing back, no one would ever know, all three of them could be Wardens, end of story.

At least, that was before that really _really _loud roar hit their ears.

It was almost like thunder, actually. A powerful, gut-wrenching boom that shook the air itself. The source: an elongated, powerfully muscled vivosaur standing on the ledge right above Jura and that vivosaur's heads. It appeared to be lacking skin in most places, what with the texture covering the reddish-pink splotches coating its body. Encircling these spots were light purple scales, which hardened around the head to form a several-pronged crest stretching out like snakes.

Heart raced, palms gripped, eyes changed focus rapidly. Oh no. Oh nonono. Sure, Fossil Battles were freaking sweet, but this was different. Her butthead of a brother wasn't in a Bone Buggy. And neither was that new vivosaur.

"WHAT THE HECK?!" Nate shrieked over the monitor, his face paling significantly. He had better be freaking out. This was definitely no joke; not with Jura out there and the two of them safe and secure.

The newcomer leaped down from the ledge, its massive legs absorbing the fall with ease. Yellow, reptilian eyes locked on the small vivosaur and Jura before it began its slow approach. Maw hanging open, purple tongue hanging out, the brute marched up towards its prey. Head whipping back, then forwards, another skull-rattling roar pierced the air, the force of which knocked Jura on to his back. Somehow, the small reptile in front of him had managed to stay standing.

A stream of panicked screams flew from Nate's side of the monitor. "THIS IS BAD! REALLYREALLYREALLY BAD! THIS IS ABOUT AS BAD AS BAD CAN GET!"

"You don't think I realize that?!" Tria shouted back, trying her best to suppress the fear inching its way into her tone. Luckily, her pink haired friend seemed too afraid to notice. No need for him to know she was getting as worked up as he was, even if it was only mentally.

Hands clenched to the steering wheel harder and harder. What to do, what to do? Maybe… Yeah, that could work! Shaky hands fumbled with the switch to the window. It hummed down gradually. Too gradually. Come on, go faster!

"JURA!" He seemed to glance back at her. That was a start. "LEAVE THAT STUPID VIVOSAUR AND MAKE A BREAK FOR IT!"

The blunette sat, leaning out the window, teeth grit, waiting for her stupid brother to run back to her. But did he? Of course not. Because he was so darn responsible, or some other crap like that.

Moving to all fours, Jura began to crawl up next to the tiny vivosaur staring up at the massive, twelve foot tall beast. He then grabbed the reptilian eyesore and clutched it to his chest protectively, apparently glaring at their attacker. A small, squeaky roar exited said eyesore's jaws. Gall, they were both idiots.

At least Nate agreed with her. "What are those two doing?" He appeared almost as incredulous as she. "Get out of there, you dummies!"

Another stomp, another blood-curdling roar. Honestly, her heart couldn't take much more of this. Adrenaline rushes were great and all, but not in this context.

Then, it lunged. That sorry, son of a gun lunged at Jura. Long, curved fangs ready to rip through his flesh, spill his blood, devour his meat-

A ginger cannonball smacked into the flank of the huge carnivore, knocking it off balance and away from her equally ginger brother. A long, drawn out sigh escaped Tria's throat as she slammed her face against her dashboard. She was in a freaking Bone Buggy. As in, she could shoot Maisy out at will for protection.

The Proto, easily dwarfed by the theropod, stood bravely and steadfastly against it. Jura, vivosaur still held tightly in his arms, scrambled up to his feet and made a mad beeline for the Bone Buggy. Hopping into his seat, making sure to slam and lock the door behind him, the redhead broke out in mildly shallow gasps as he flopped against the upholstery.

"You freaking moron!" A gloved hand smacked roughly against his shoulder, earning a surprised yelp. Tria glowered at her twin, trying to hide the extreme concern damning up in every fiber of her being. "Why would you do something like that? You could've died!"

The freckle-faced teen tittered, sounding mildly insane, and managed to pull himself into a slouching position. "I'm not sure why I did it, but I'm sure as heck that if I ever try it again, chain me down and stop me ASAP."

With an annoyed sigh, or maybe it was relieved, Tria hit him one last time. Taking a quick look at the small reptile seated on Jura's lap, the blunette faced forward once again and focused on the battle at hand. Hopefully Maisy was holding her own.

The petit ceratopsid had already worn herself out quite a bit. The monstrous, purple laced vivosaur facing her, however, seemed to be as energized as it had been at the start of the fight. That was just fantastic.

Maisy, equally apprehensive about the situation at hand, made one last desperate attack to defend herself. Using the last of her strength, the Proto leaped into the air, spinning around and flying towards her carnivorous opponent. However, the yellow eyed brute gyrated, thick tail slamming into the spinning sphere like a baseball bat.

A shrill, pained shriek ripped through the air, and the ginger vivosaur crashed against the hood of the twins' Bone Buggy. Flashing, she reverted back to a yellow disk which was promptly collected by VR-00M. And that just about settled it. They were screwed.

Maw closing slightly, the victorious beast began to advance towards the teens quaking within their vehicles. In hindsight, they probably could have drove away at that point, but fear is incredibly restrictive when it wants to be. For that moment, it had chained their feet from the gas pedal and any thought of driving away with that now-captured little bugger of a vivosaur.

It was probably the way that those jaws came together in such a manner that the rogue appeared to be smiling, smirking even. Like it just knew that it was going to get a great big meal. That cocky not-so-little piece of crap…

Steps shook the ground as the purple and red reptile began to close in. But, thanks to some earlier thinking that she had forgotten about, Tria subconsciously lifted her foot off the break pedal, exhaling loudly upon realizing that she had shifted into reverse at some point. So, as the ghastly vivosaur got closer, the Bone Buggy rolled away.

However, this greatly frustrated their pursuer. So, it took a couple of faster than normal steps towards their retreating Buggy, then finished the sudden acceleration with a lunging bite. Seconds before the snapping, creaking sound of metal being crushed should have hit their ears, the cracking sound of bone smacking bone reverberated instead.

Staggering backwards, the crested theropod shook its now-injured head. One of its frontal teeth was clearly knocked at a weird angle. The vivosaur responsible, grey skinned, blue sailed, and intricately patterned snarled a few times, unleashing a few warning snaps to ward off the injured brute.

Luckily for the aggressor, it recognized that this newcomer clearly outranked it. With little thought of entering combat, it turned tail and charged off deeper into Paradise Beach. With a satisfied nod, the colorful new vivosaur also retreated, but into a Dino Gear which promptly vanished to the larger, cooler looking orange and red Bone Buggy that had just arrived.

Tria, while confused about the new vivosaur and freaking rad Bone Buggy, couldn't help but direct most, if not all, of her attention towards the weird squealing noise her brother was making. His bright green eyes stared, gawking at the larger vehicle. Sure that car was sweet, but it wasn't that sweet.

Nate was the first to comment on the situation. "That's right! You better run, you son of a gun!" The smugness in his voice was deadly. To him, that is. She was certain she'd put him through heck for doing virtually nothing and sounding so cocky about it.

"Hey, and thanks, whoever you are. You really saved our bacon." Well, he did transfer the credit to whom it was due. Maybe she wouldn't heckle him as badly.

"Don't mention it." WAIT. THAT WAS A FAMILIAR VOICE. "I couldn't risk the lives of such promising candidates."

The monitor went to a split screen, one half with Nate, the other half with… Oh gosh no. Of course it was Stryker. It had to be Stryker. That's just about how her luck always played out.

The brunet smiled, a hint of teasing in his tone. "You lot have had quite the first day."

Gasping, Jura immediately sat up straight, fixing up his messy hair to the best of his ability. Their pink haired friend also seemed panicked, his face pale and his mouth hanging open. Tria was determined to keep her cool, though, so she crossed her arms behind her head and leaned back in her seat.

"C-Captain Stryker!" Nate stammered, transforming into the same, jittering mass he had been when they had first met. And, just like then, he couldn't seem to stop talking.

"W-we're really sorry, honest! There was this kid and he talked awhile and my brain went to pudding and I found a button and pushed it and then their was this thing and a red vivosaur in the thing then it ran and we got out here and-" He paused to catch his breath, head hanging as he did so. "Just please don't bust us down to grunts or whatever's lower than grunts! I don't wanna be disqualified, but if I had to choose between that and grunt I'd choose-"

"Nate. Chill."

Tria's remark was answered by the teen flopping back in his seat, allowing his nerves to freeze up his tongue. Hopefully they had a fighting chance at getting away with this now.

"While it is true that you three shouldn't have been messing around with that machine, not to mention let that vivosaur out of containment, you did genuinely attempt to fix the problem."

At first, Tria wasn't sure if Stryker was messing with them or something. Sure, he was the head of a huge organization and probably didn't have a need to get their hopes up only to crush them horribly, but they had screwed up pretty badly. They deserved it. Well, mainly Jura. He should have tried harder to stop them from going into that room.

But, judging by the forgiveness in his indigo eyes and his relaxed posture, the gaudily dressed man was actually letting them off easy. Smiling, the blunette eased up her tense muscles. Huh. Apparently they had tightened up at some point. Must have been spending too much time with Jura…

Unfortunately, the Captain's praise soon shifted from the three of them (her) to just one person. One darn, not-her-person.

Eyes shone with admiration. "Jura, I must say it was quite brave of you to run out in front of the Gorgo to save that vivosaur."

Tria's body went back to being rigid, maybe even more so than before. Hold up. Since when was her brother supposed to be recognized for bravery of all things? Smarts, sure. Courage, heck no, that was supposed to be her thing.

Her redheaded sibling seemed to take the compliment well, what with his freckled cheeks flushing. A finger tugged anxiously at his bandana, adding to his embarrassment. He always did know how to take a compliment well.

"Err, thank you, sir. I like to think that I'm doing my best whenever possible," Jura replied in that overly-respectful tone of his. It sounded so sickly sweet in comparison to how he normally spoke. In her opinion, it made him sound like a complete moron, buuuut adults appreciated it for some reason.

And apparently Stryker was one of those adults. "Well, your courage, as well as that of your sister and Nate, has made me decide to keep you three in the Warden program."

Nate smirked, his confidence renewed as he let out an excited shout. "Wooooo! In your face, punishment!" Hands clutched into fists as he threw his arms over his head. Less than a second later, he slapped said appendages to his lap, laughing nervously.

"I mean, uh, thank you sir!"

Stryker chuckled lightheartedly, dismissing the pink haired teen's outburst. "It's not a problem. Just drop off that vivosaur with Professor Little, and we can pretend this whole fiasco never happened."

"Sounds good to me!" Tria beamed, shooting the brunet a thumbs-up. Her brother nodded eagerly in agreement.

"Oh, and come over to my office tomorrow after breakfast. I'm ready to announce the details of your upcoming Warden Test." And, just like that, the Captain's face disappeared from the monitor. The sound of his revving engine filled the air, and he was gone almost as fast as he had appeared.

Mauve eyes drifted towards the brightly colored vivosaur seated on Jura's lap. Its head cocked, bright green eyes filled with curiosity. Gosh it was obnoxious.

Resting a gloved hand atop the reptile's head, the blunette yawned whilst trying to shout. "Right! Well, let's get rid of this annoying eyesore and hit the sack!"

* * *

"Oh, thank goodness! I was worried Alice and I would have to start checking dig sites for him!"

Professor Little grinned, running up to Jura in order to take the big mouthed vivosaur in his arms. The redhead's sister sniggered at the disappointment on his face as he handed over the red scaled creature. Though Little trying to hold on to the small vivosaur was much more entertaining, what with the reptile being close to the same size as him.

Tria rolled her eyes while her brother hovered over the small professor just in case he were to drop the vivosaur. But, the boy appeared to know what he was doing, and managed to carry the large-by-comparison vivosaur back to his containment unit without assistance. She had to admit, that was quite impressive.

The two males returned a few minutes later, happily chatting about science related stuff. At least her nerd of a brother found someone who actually cared about nerd stuff to talk about nerd-y stuff with. That meant she would hear less of it. Yes.

"So, vivosaur's taken care of?" the blunette inquired, double checking that her sibling had not distracted Little from his task. The green haired boy nodded, a friendly smile on his face.

"Of course! And even if it wasn't, Alice would make sure it was," he assured, taking a moment to straighten out his lab coat. His response was, of course, a bit… confusing, as was almost everything else he said.

Her hand gestured in circles, signaling for him to explain. "And Alice is…?"

Silver eyes lit up as the boy recognized an opportunity to speak. Oh crap. What had she just prodded him to rant on about?

"Oh! Alice is…" Prof. Little trailed off, hands patting at his pockets, perplexed as to why he wasn't finding what he was looking for. After a few seconds of clueless searching, a light seemed to flicker on in his brain. Fingers moved up to the pocket on the chest area of his coat.

He withdrew a small, green disc with a theropod shaped silhouette inscribed on its front. The shape was spikier and smaller, though, than things like a T-Rex or Allosaurus.

The boy's posture shone with pride. "This is Alice! My only vivosaur, and the first to be revived by my miniature revival machine."

"Not to be rude, but what the heck is she?" Tria inquired, tapping at the metallic circle. Little pulled it away from her reach protectively, placing the Dino Gear back into his pocket.

"An Aero Yutie, and an extremely intelligent one at that," he quipped, giving the pocket holding Alice's Gear a tap with his hand. "She understands my research much more than you ever could."

A sniggered interjection from Jura added to the burn from Little. "Please, Nate could understand your research more than Tria."

"Shut up, you dork!" Gloved hands attempted to shove the redhead over with one sudden jar. He stumbled forward, narrowly avoiding the younger male, before face-planting on to the metal floor. Sure, it looked painful, but he had it coming.

The Prof. cringed, taking his turn to hover over the teen gradually climbing back up to his feet. No wonder the two of them got along well. They were both really paranoid nerds. Huh.

After confirming that her brother wasn't seriously injured, which he never was under any circumstance, Little sent them off to their temporary room. They were fairly tired, after all. Not to mention how nice having separate beds for the first time ever was going to be…

* * *

**Gall it's been ages... Whew. Sorry for the huuuuuuge freaking delay. May was hectic for me, what with school shoving end of the year homework in my face, then I had driver's ed for the next three weeks after school got out in June, and there was always lots of homework, then my birthday, then I got a minor job, then I started being really tired and ugh...**

**BUT driver's ed is done now! Yay! So I officially have a bunch more time now to work on stuff like this! Especially because of the Avian Influenza outbreak! So let's just hope I don't get super lazy now...**


	5. Breakfast and Screaming

That night had been absolutely wonderful. Tria was in her own bed, he was in his own bed; everything was just awesome. They had never had separate beds before, what with the lack of money at their house. It was put towards everything _but_ getting a second bed. But that was okay; they had always tolerated each other.

But, a good night's sleep meant nothing without a great breakfast. And, since the meeting with Stryker wasn't until some time after ten (he never had been very specific about times), there was plenty of time to eat something and chat with the other Warden candidates.

Jura yawned, stretching as he walked into the slightly busy cafeteria. He recognized all seven of the other candidates, though only four of them were sitting together. That purple haired guy, Leon, was off to the corner at one of the more secluded tables, whereas that Australian, Sydney, seemed content talking with some other people, probably Wardens, as did Yamamoto.

"Tria doesn't know what she's missing," the redhead smirked, heading over to the food line languidly. His sister had decided that 8:30 was too early a time to get out of bed. But that was her loss.

Getting a piece of toast, some scrambled eggs, and a carton of orange juice, he wove through tables and people standing around, talking, to end up staring at the group whilst holding his blue tray of food. They seemed fairly preoccupied in their discussion though. Perhaps it would be best to come back later…

"Oh, hey Jura!" Penny chirped, the first to acknowledge him. Her light blue eyes reflected a combination of drowsiness and hospitality. A gloved hand delicately patted the seat beside her. "You can sit with us. We're all equally awkward here."

Grinning gratefully, Jura plopped down in the designated spot, taking a moment to figure out where everyone else was as he did so. Nate was sitting on the other side of Penny, in some sort of heated debate with Dahlia, who was across from him. Roland was next to her, but appeared to be a bit nervous about their proximity. Which, knowing that girl, was really no surprise.

Speaking of the devil, apparently his presence had distracted her from Nate. Slightly intimidating amber gaze flicking in his direction, the gearhead smirked. Oh gosh. Nate definitely told her about the Gorgo.

"So, heard from pinkie here that you guys had your butts handed to you by some rogue vivosaur," Dahlia sniggered, briefly gesturing to said boy, who scoffed in reply.

Feet shifted anxiously beneath the table. "Yeah… Stryker had to come help us out."

"Yeesh. You guys must've screwed up pretty bad," she concluded, arms crossing smugly. After a moment of thought, it seemed that curiosity replaced her brief streak of cockiness.

"Wait, so does that mean that you guys saw his Spino ST?"

Maybe Nate's blabbering hadn't been so bad after all. Sitting up a little straighter, Jura smiled and nodded eagerly. "You bet! It's even cooler in person!"

"Dang! You lucky ducks!" Dahlia exclaimed, slamming one of her hands on the table, causing the other occupants to jump slightly at the sound. A look of determination came across her countenance, vaguely reminding him of Tria. "Think there's enough time for me to get in a bad enough spot for Stryker to show up?"

And, like his sister, it was probably best to shoot down ideas like that as early as possible. "Well, it's almost ten, so no."

"Eh, whatever," she replied dismissively, waving her hand to emphasize the point. Her usual cocky expression returned. "Once I'm a Warden, I'll probably see that bad boy a heck of a lot more."

"Exactly," Jura nodded in agreement, hiding his relief. She seemed to think in a clearer manner than his sister, so that was a pleasant change of pace. Picking up his now cold toast, the redhead began to munch away at his breakfast.

He had just begun to make a dent in his scrambled eggs when Nate stood up, empty tray in hand, and began walking away from the table. He returned only seconds later, running full tilt, and only stopping long enough to blurt out, "I'm going up to Stryker's office!" before bolting off again.

So he would rather be early than late. That was definitely a good habit to get into. Jura would not have minded heading up there himself, but he still had to finish eating and fetch Tria. His fellow candidates began leaving one by one, Dahlia going first after rapidly gulping down the last swig of her milk, and Penny following last once she had apparently waited long enough for him to finish eating.

It was a bit past ten when Jura took the last bite of his eggs and washed them down with the remaining dribble of his juice. He dropped off his dirty tray, placing it as quietly as possible to prevent attention from drawing to him, and speed-walked back to his and Tria's room.

Knocking lightly, barely hard enough to be audible, Jura silently shifted his feet and patiently waited for his sister. It took a few minutes, but a groggy, blue haired girl emerged whilst rubbing her eyes and yawning. Stepping to the side and allowing her to exit the room completely, the redhead motioned for her to begin the trek down the hall before him. Ladies first, after all.

She failed to acknowledge his gesture, but took the lead anyways. Sluggish steps and the occasional grumbling about having to go to a meeting led the pair to the elevator, and eventually into it. The ride up was almost as awkward as the first time they had gone up together, only this one was completely silent.

Finally the 'ding' sounded, and the doors parted to show the other excited candidates. Penny, who was chatting with Nate, waved to Jura, who returned the gesture apprehensively. Gall they were late. Stryker was already there and everything. And Nate looked rather smug about that, too.

Of course, he didn't even need to look to know where his sister had run off to. She had joined Dahlia near the Captain, the duo making quite a bit of noise as Tria began telling her about the Gorgo incident. But in her own fashion, of course. She had to sound like the hero, after all, and in some ways she was.

He had just managed to reach his blonde friend when Stryker cleared his throat, silencing the entire room. It was quite impressive really. How a rowdy bunch of teenagers had managed to hear that and stop talking on the dime was beyond him. It must be a perk of being the Captain.

Dark blue eyes surveyed the candidates, double checking that everyone was completely attentive. Satisfied with what he saw, the tall brunet nodded, a relaxed grin spreading across his face. "Well, it appears most everyone passed their driving lesson with flying colors."

Jura took the moment to cringe as his peers glanced in his direction. Gosh news spreads fast.

"But that was basic stuff; it's time to talk about the Warden Test," Stryker continued rapidly, drawing attention away from the redhead. Said teen let out a relieved sigh. Holy smokes, was that guy nice to him.

Apprehensive looks and excited shouts were surprisingly equally divided throughout the room. Jura felt a bit sorry for those nervous; they probably raised a weaker vivosaur, or maybe just lacked the confidence. He could definitely relate to the latter.

"Now, in this test, you'll form in teams of two and face off against civilian fighters in the Fossil Stadium. If you win twice, you'll pass and earn your Warden license, as well as a hand-shake from yours truly."

Turning around, Stryker picked up some box off his desk which he shook a couple of times once he was facing the candidates. "We'll start by deciding the teams. Everyone draw a lot."

You would have thought he'd said 'Everyone draw a million dollars' by the way he was swarmed all of a sudden. By the time Jura had made it up the box, it was completely empty. Though, judging by the look on the Captain's face, that was on purpose.

"You're sharing a lot with your sister, just so the numbers work out even." And once again, he and Tria had to share something because they were twins. _Hooray_. At least Stryker looked a bit sorry about it.

Exhaling loudly, the freckle-faced teen spun around on his heel and headed over to his sister. She was holding a small key-chain with a decoration shaped like a Proto. Where the heck did she get that?

Mauve eyes flicked up to him. "Oh, hey bro. This was the lot. The heck do you think it means?"

And the lots were some sort of game. That was even better. Taking the object from Tria, Jura scrutinized it briefly, then scanned over the room. Leon was holding something that resembled the generic symbol for Air vivosaurs, Nate had an Edapho, Roland had a generic Earth symbol- Oh.

"We're with Roland," Jura stated flatly. He wasn't exactly sure _why_ that was something to be unenthusiastic about, but it was. So, he let Tria take the lead on letting their new teammate know he was their teammate. She ran up to the plump teen, buzzing with excitement as per usual.

It didn't take long for the rest of the group to figure out how they were going to be split up. For the most part, everyone was alright with who they were paired with. Except Leon, who was paired with Nate, but he didn't seem to like anyone _period_.

Teams were confirmed by Stryker, then written down for later reference to ensure people didn't try to switch partners for the Test. It didn't take too long, what with there only being four teams, but it felt much longer due to the tension in the air.

The parting words were finally spoken. "Here's a last piece of advice; don't relax just because you're facing civilian fighters."

"_Well, duh," _Jura mused to himself, rolling his eyes. _"Some of the best Fossil Fighters out there are civilians. Wardens just maintain crap so said civilians can become the best without interruption."_

"As I'm sure you've heard, the folks that come to this chain of Fossil Parks are renowned for their prowess in Fossil Battles. They may not be Wardens, but it would be unwise to take them lightly."

A sort of 'can we go yet?' feeling filled the room, which appeared to affect even the Captain. Probably because he was realizing that his words were being taken in as rambling to teenagers whose minds were already out digging fossils and battling with vivosaurs. Gears appeared to turn in his head as he thought out the fastest way to summarize his speech.

Gloved fingers tapped at his chin. "Well, Paradise Beach, the dig site you all went to for your lesson, is open for you to go to and from as you please. You've got today and tomorrow to prepare for and complete the Test. If you haven't taken part in the battles by tomorrow evening, your team will automatically be disqualified from becoming Wardens."

A loud _bang! _from Stryker stomping his boot to the metallic floor demanded attention from his absent-minded audience. With a grin, the gaudily dressed Captain threw his left arm out to the side dramatically. It did look pretty cool, though.

"As long as you and your allies support each other, you'll have nothing to fear! Now get out there and fight!"

* * *

It was harder than one might think to leave the office, what with only seven other kids, eight if he counted Tria, to get around in order to leave. With there being three who would push and shove to get to the front, two that appeared to want to leave but would not compete with the formers, three more that would let everyone else go first, and one that didn't give a rip, it was impossible to really leave in a calm, orderly manner.

By a pure miracle, Jura and Tria had managed to leave together. While the taller of the pair was suspicious as to why his sibling, who he had expected to run ahead with Dahlia and hang out with her until she was needed elsewhere, had willingly stayed behind with him, he did enjoy her company when around other people he didn't know too well. That way, she could do all the talking. Even when her talking usually got both of them into trouble.

And apparently, she was just about ready to start some of said talking. That purple haired guy, Leon, made the mistake of meandering past them whilst grumbling about the Warden Test. Which, judging by the curious glint in her eyes, could only mean a heck of a lot of trouble for the two of them. Because, frankly, Jura was kind of intimidated by that guy. Up close, he was obviously taller _and_ older than the two of them.

Tria did not appear to share his trepidation, and shifted her position so she was walking between her brother and Leon. Her stare bore stubbornly into the side of the older teen's head until he finally rolled his eyes and met her gaze. And he looked pretty mad. Great…

Despite the glower, Tria managed to keep up her confident air. "You sure sound mad."

Judging by the cocky laugh, he agreed with her statement. "This test is a crock!" The purple haired teen's voice gained a touch of frustration as he continued. "What's the point of teaming up in a fight? There's only one person you can trust in a Fossil Battle, and that's yourself."

His arms crossed, face contorting to express his discontent. "I'd rather do my own thing with my three vivosaurs, not use one and have two rookies dragging me down. No one else can know what's going on in your head, y'know?"

"Oh yeah, totally," Tria smirked, hands going to her hips. "I'm a lone wolf like you!"

Leon's grey eyes flicked to Jura, who flinched slightly, before he chuckled a bit. "You? A lone wolf? Don't make me laugh." Though, for someone who wished not to laugh, he sure was smiling wide. "Though, I suppose I appreciate the sentiment."

The moment was short-lived as Leon realized that he was grinning, which did not fit his apathetic bad boy nature. Forcing a scowl and turning away from Tria, whose happiness was as contagious as ever, he grumbled, "Anyway, better mount up and take care of this malarkey," before trudging away in a purposeful manner.

Casting a curious glance to his sister, who opened her mouth and pointed down her throat in reply, Jura sniggered and slid his hands into his pockets. "So, are we off to Paradise Beach then?" He tried to make his tone sound hopeful, just to make sure she got the message.

She giggled, shoving him lightly. "We'll get your darn vivosaur, no need to sound all desperate."

"I just wanted to be sure," the redhead smiled, holding his hands up in mock defense.

"And I just want to get this over with so we can fight!"

Before Jura could even attempt to stop her, Tria bolted off as fast as she could, whizzing off towards the front door. Unfortunately for her, something, or rather someone, was rolling at her from the opposite direction. He could only close his eyes and cringe as he heard his sibling yell something that sounded a bit like swearing, followed by the _wham!_ of her hitting the floor.

Upon cracking his eyes open, Jura could only sigh. As suspected, Tria had been taken out the same way he had yesterday via Roland, the difference being that she hopped back up quite easily. Show off…

"The heck, man!?" the blunette exclaimed, glowering at Roland as he scrambled back up to his feet. He scratched the back of his neck, tittering.

"Sorry, sorry!" Well, he appeared as sheepish as the time he'd bowled Jura over. "I was trying to catch up with you guys, and I tripped over something."

After a moment of thought, Tria shrugged and grinned. "Guess I can't argue with that."

"Why exactly _were_ you trying to catch up with us?" Jura inquired skeptically whilst joining his sibling. Even if Roland was being polite, he had been the cause of yesterday's skinned elbow. Teammates or not, the redhead was going to be a bit critical of him.

Light blue eyes lit up. "Oh yeah, I was wondering if you guys wanted to head out to Paradise Beach one last time before going to the Fossil Stadium."

"Well, duh," Tria replied, pupils rolling light-heartedly. She aimed a thumb at her sibling, snickering. "This bozo won't shut up about getting his own vivosaur, so we have to get out there to get him one."

"Great! Then we can get really strong for the Warden Test!" the brunet beamed, to which she laughed.

"I'm already plenty strong!" the smallest smirked, earning a slight scowl from her brother. "But Jura's gonna need to train up his new vivo, so we can do that too." Oh yeah, she sure was strong. Her Proto got its butt handed to it by a Gorgo, albeit a strong Gorgo. She _definitely_ didn't need to train either.

"Then I guess I'll meet you guys at Paradise Beach!" Cheerful, Roland turned and headed off for the dig site, merrily singing something about digging up fossils as he went. Guess he was about as excited as he and Tria were.

There was a brief pause in speech when Jura was suddenly shoved by his sister, who bolted towards the front doors yelling, "RACE YOU TO THE BONE BUGGY!" Of course, it took the redhead a few seconds to reorient himself, but her challenge shortened the time needed. Before he knew it, he was charging out after Tria, though much slower than her. Darn her athletic-ness.

* * *

Luckily, his clumsy pace did not act as a hindrance for once. Tria was a good sport, shockingly, and decided that since Jura still had to dig up the bones for his first vivosaur, it would only be fair for him to drive. Even if he was, admittedly, a little too friendly with the brake pedal.

Upon reaching the dig site, they had met up with Roland for a brief moment, during which they discussed how to go about group digging, as well as a bit of input on how they thought the Warden Test would go. While Tria was certain she had everything covered for it, Roland's apprehensiveness was a bit refreshing. Jura could relate to that quite a bit.

Eventually it was decided that their new teammate would follow them around the dig site, assisting in fossil battles when needed, and digging up anything that the twins did not feel like claiming for themselves. With that settled, Jura began to creep down the road in their Bone Buggy, earning frustrated tapping of fingers from his sister, whom he tried to ignore.

After what felt like a painful eternity, the redhead began to feel a bit less anxious about driving. It wasn't so bad once he really got going. Sure there were some bumps, and water did still seem kind of weird to drive through, but overall the experience was fairly enjoyable. Until rogue vivosaurs came into the picture.

One of those red rogues, Alxas was its name, was wading through the water Jura happened to be driving through. Squealing, he slammed on the breaks, heart racing as he froze up. Luckily for Tria, they weren't moving too fast in the first place, what with the water and her brother's overly cautious pace, so her face did not bang into the dashboard. But she still looked cross with him.

"Would you chill? Maisy's got this!" the blunette smirked, hand smacking against the picture of said vivosaur on the monitor. The ginger cannonball appeared seconds later, knocking the vivosaur away with ease as she was launched into it. However, upon landing in the water, the waves easily engulfed her petit size, and her stubby legs flailed in an attempt to keep her within breathing range.

"…You're an idiot," Jura sighed, gloved hand smacking to his face. Outside, the attacking Alxas cocked its head, intrigued at their struggling vivosaur. Golden claws twitching, it seemed to be debating whether to strike or enjoy the show.

Sloshing water drew the redhead's attention from his hand to the battle, and he jumped as a massive, blue and yellow quadruped charge past the Bone Buggy and gore the Alxas. With a swing of its huge, crested head, the reptile tossed its Christmas-colored victim away, snorting as the biped stood up and ruffled its feathers, attempting to remove the water from itself.

Roland's grinning face flashed onto their monitor. "Hey, guys! How do you like Tops?"

The 30-foot-long Tricera snarled, charging once more into the rogue. Though the long-clawed vivosaur tried to retaliate, it stood little match against a Water vivosaur, and a large one at that. Sparking, the Alxas reverted down to a crimson Dino Gear, which was collected by Roland's VR-00M. The two vivosaurs quickly followed suite. Maisy appeared to be happy about that.

"He's great!" Tria cheered, a bit too happy for almost having her vivosaur drown. Still, her sibling agreed with that statement, and he nodded whole-heartedly.

"Oh yeah," he beamed, sending the brunet a thumbs-up, "I don't know what you were talking about earlier! You're ready as heck for the Warden Test!"

Blushing, the stout teen poked at his cheek in a flustered manner. "Er, thanks, guys! Guess I just need a little more confidence."

"Exactly! You got this!" the female twin added, though judging by her tone she simply wanted to end the conversation. Plus the fact that she kept nudging Jura in an impatient manner. "Now, let's go get that new vivosaur of yours!"

A gulp, followed by the trepidatious bobbing of his head. "Alright, sis. Just give me a sec."

So, after a few moments of trying to drive forward, without momentum, through the water, Jura managed to get their vehicle up on dry land, a hill to be exact, and steered them to the top before stopping. He tapped at the sonar, eyes widening as he noticed the blip on the screen indicating a fossil was right in front of them.

"Good job, bro! Now dig up that stupid thing so we can go fight!" The following 'pat' on the back sure hurt a lot. Gosh, she needed to work on hitting people lightly.

Grabbing the joysticks, Jura leaned forward, squinting as he scrutinized the rock to see what needed to get done. The rock covering the fossil actually appeared quite thin, maybe thin enough to just drill it and be done. He twitched the joystick ever-so-slightly, cringing at the grinding induced by the tool, and found that the line was completely cleared. The bone beneath it was in pristine condition and everything. How convenient.

A few swipes later, the skull fossil was completely unearthed. It was a bit worn from the ages, but still looked fairly nice. For a fossil, that is. VR-00M floated in from wherever it stayed in the Bone Buggy and ran one of its scans over the bones, confirming how well he had done.

"Excavation complete! Specimen: Alxas, Type: Head fossil, Score: 100!"

"What!? 100!? How is that fair!?" Tria pouted, face scrunched up in frustration. Jura crossed his arms smugly, a grin on his face. This was too fun.

"This is the first fossil you've seen from this vivosaur. Commencing revival!"

Just as it had been with Maisy, colorful light engulfed the skull, eventually removing it from the rock entirely. The light swirled up into a much larger shape than a Proto, though, and became elongated as opposed to round. With a flash, a vivosaur quite similar to the rogue they had just defeated sat next to their Bone Buggy.

It was a bit taller than their Bone Buggy, had the usual red and green of an Alxas, but seemed off somehow. Probably because of the assorted bald spot scattered across its back, which looked kind of mange-y. One of its eyes twitched occasionally, and the green feathers covering its underside seemed to fluff out at random places. Over all, it was a mess.

Jura could only stare at his vivosaur. For 100 points, he'd been expecting Zeus in vivosaur form. And this thing was far from it. It was just… weird. Tria's hysterical laughter wasn't making it any better.

"Hey there…" he stated softly, rolling down his window to do so. The vivosaur scratched at one of its bald spots with its golden claws, sending a few crimson feathers to the ground. Oh dear.

"_HELLO!" _a loud, dopey sounding voice boomed in his head, to which Jura covered his ears. Which wasn't effective at all, what with it being a mental communication. Upon noticing that its Fighter hadn't responded, the Alxas continued. _"CAN YOU HEAR ME?! ARE YOU DEAF!? TESTING, TESTING, ONE, TWO, THRE-!"_

"I can hear you, shut up!" Jura exclaimed, head ringing. Gosh, he was loud. And Tria's cackling was still making things worse.

"_SORRY."_

Oh gosh, that was his normal volume. Exhaling excessively, hoping to convey his displeasure over the Alxas' noisiness, Jura leaned back in his seat, feeling exhausted all of a sudden. Unfortunately, the vivosaur did not pick up on this, and his golden claws rested on the window, small head shoving into the boy's face.

"_WHAT'S WRONG?" _The Alxas' voice seemed to rattle his brain around in his skull with its sheer volume.

"You're loud," Jura replied flatly.

"_MAYBE YOU'RE JUST QUIET."_

Hand smacking his snout, the redhead shoved the Alxas from the Bone Buggy. "Why don't you just turn into a Dino Gear and leave me alone, or something?"

"_I'M BORED. AND THAT SOUNDS BORING." _This was it. This was what was going to kill him. Vivosaur induced migraines.

"Look, I'm gonna name you, put you in the machine thing, and then maybe we can do some fighting later." Eyes squeezed shut, and Jura silently pleaded that the Alxas would quiet his volume. But, of course, that would have been too convenient. Too lucky.

Elongated claws tapped to the vivosaur's chin. _"WELL, I GUESS THAT SOUNDS NOT-BORING ENOUGH."_

"Thank goodness," Jura sighed, head cocking back in an exaggerated manner. He barely had to rack his brains for a name, what with the claws and the reddish feathers. His gaze returned to the obnoxious reptile, and with a worn out tone, stated simply, "You're name's Jack."

"_I LIKE THAT NAME."_

"Great."

With a flash, Jack reverted to a Dino Gear, his blaring voice gone for the time being. Thank goodness. Well, it was replaced by Tria's mocking laughter, which was still going strong for some reason. Thankfully, that was not nearly as bad as the mental screaming from Jack.

And yet, Jura still wanted to use the loud-mouth in a battle.

* * *

**Well, this was supposed to be ready a week ago, but my dad dragged us off to a motorcycle race so I couldn't work on it. Though I had before that to work on this… Heh… heh… heh…**

**Blame Razia's Shadow. Blame it. That freaking musical-type-thing is so amazing, I couldn't help but be sucked in. But I will try harder. This summer's just been so busy for me. I thought I'd have more time and motivation to write, but I really don't. So yell at me if I take forever or something.**

**Also, since there's been a bit of question on it, yes, the explanation by Little about the lack of Vivosaurs in the fossil parks was a headcanon. So yeah. Hopefully that's all I needed to say.**


	6. Dents and Snorts

A few slow, vaguely monotonous digs later, Jura had excavated a few pearls and a pair of legs for his weird Alxas. He'd only gotten 60 points on them though, so it made up for the perfectly cleaned head. At least, in Tria's mind it did.

After her sibling had finished his little cleaning spree, Tria went back to driving them around to random places. A quick run-in with a Tarbo led them to a leg fossil for said Vivosaur, which was cleaned at 94 points. In order to eliminate strife, Jura had suggested they share the Tarbo in order to keep numbers even. As lame as that was, Tria figured a low Ranked Tarbo wasn't worth the fight. They named it Racer.

Eventually the sky began to tint red as the sun began to set. Jura was half-asleep in his seat, and Tria's stomach was growling. Suddenly sleeping through breakfast and not having lunch was seeming like a horrible idea. Huh.

An unspoken agreement between the two siblings was made to head back as soon as possible. Just as Tria began to turn them around to do just that, the jingling of an incoming call stopped her. Roland's face popped up, and though he looked just as tired as them, he appeared to have something exciting enough to make him look lively.

A wide grin that seemed offensive somehow to Tria greeted them, as well as a half-yawned inquiry of, "Hey, you guys wanna go check out a rare fossil in West Hollows I heard about?"

And yet, the grin bothered her less when coupled with that statement. "Heck yeah! We're totally in, right, Jura?"

"Sure," Jura sighed, propping his elbow up with the window and resting his chin on his hand. That was a good sign. If he wasn't enthusiastic, then the fossil was all hers.

"Great! Lead the way, Roland!"

A few revs later, the small group entered a large, circular area, where Tria was certain her brother had dug up the leg fossil for Jack. Roland must have forgotten about the 'rare fossil' when they had gone through the first time. She had zoned out a bit, what with the monotonous pattern of their driving, and barely managed to avoid rear ending Roland's green Bone Buggy when he stopped abruptly. In fact, she was certain she had with the crashing sound that accompanied their stop.

But, as Jura was so kind to point out, a huge boulder had just fallen in front of Roland. So she hadn't hit him. That was good. Oh wait. Huge boulder. That was not so good.

"Whew! That almost crushed us!" Roland exclaimed, recoiling. Tria couldn't help but snort.

"Well, it almost hit _you_," she sniggered, face scrunching up as she laughed at the brunet obliviously whilst her sibling stared out the window wide-eyed.

"Tria, can we _MOVE_!?" Jura squealed suddenly, giving the bluenette a few forceful shoves. She glanced at him, perplexed, only to be jostled around as something rammed into their Bone Buggy from above. With a yowl, the pair ducked down, greeted by the sound of the roof being dented inwards.

Well, that couldn't be good.

Eventually the shrieking of bending metal subsided, and was replaced by the garbled up sound of the radio. "You gu-... -kay?"

"Was that Roland?" Tria winced, gaze moving to the cracked monitor on the dashboard now filled with static.

"I think so…" Jura replied, eyes squeezed shut. He was probably too scared to see if he was hurt. Wimp.

"Alright." She sat up, scrutinizing the shattered window to ensure there were not any shards that could slice her up. Luckily, the sharp ones were rather loose, and she easily pushed them from the gap. With the window cleared of painful protrusions, Tria leaned out and yelled, "ROLAND, WE'RE NOT DEAD!"

A muffled, "THAT'S GOOD!" came in reply.

Seeing no need to continue the conversation, Tria decided to see how her Bone Buggy was working. The giant rock on the hood was a pretty good indication they weren't going anywhere anytime soon. And that meant they were walking back.

However, seeing as the roof was dented inwards, the door would not budge. The next, completely logical conclusion would be to climb out the window. Ignoring Jura's protests, Tria began to wriggle out the small gap.

When she was out to about her waist, the blunette briefly scanned over the area. There was really no other motive than curiosity. Unlike her brother, she wasn't paranoid that everything would kill them. Seriously, he needed to get some guts. Sometimes it was nice to just look for the sake of looki- was that a bit of purple?

Letting out a startled yelp, Tria slid back into their Bone Buggy and ducked down hardly a moment too soon. Their vehicle was tossed around as a huge maw slammed into it, massive white teeth clamping into the metal. The iron whined, displeased by the pressure forcing it further out of place.

"Jura, w-what the heck's going on?" Tria whimpered, hands grabbing onto the steering wheel for support as their Bone Buggy was lifted into the air by their attacker. He was silent for a moment, a bit preoccupied with manically slamming his hand against the monitor, trying to release Jack to fight off whatever was there.

One last frustrated punch to the glass signified he was ready to answer. "That stupid Gorgo from earlier is currently trying to EAT US," the redhead answered, sounding more aggravated than frightened. He was probably just mad at it for making him look like a total baby the last time they'd crossed paths.

"Well, what the heck do we do about it?!"

* * *

Foggy. Dark. Cold. Sleepy. Muffled noises. Numbness.

It was back to the machine. Back to sleeping for who knows how long. But that was okay. He didn't care. He wasn't bored, wasn't scared, wasn't lonely. He was just… There. Existing. Sleeping.

He hadn't felt a thing in forever.

Then suddenly, there was something. Something sudden, something frantic. His heart raced, muscles tensed; what was he feeling? This was new, not numb, and shook him to his very being. The darkness around him was unsettling, the cold metal no longer normal. Everything was just so… Frightening. He was afraid, that was the word. But why? He had never been afraid before.

But the urge was there. To break out, to see the light, to get away from what scared him. The fogginess in his brain lifted, and his small body slammed against the metal walls. They shook, and something screamed from outside. He didn't care. Another slam, more shaking walls, but this time light shone through. Almost there…!

A final slam, and the wall disappeared. Suddenly, he was tumbling out, dodging the grabby hands of the people outside. They yelled something to him, something he didn't comprehend, and didn't really care to either. All he knew was that everything was unfamiliar, and he needed to find familiarity.

Someone like that… thing that looked kind of like him. The thing that had made him feel aggressive, made him want to fight the other vivosaur. Yes, that thing was probably what was making him scared. Maybe the thing was scared, too.

Feet moving quickly, he charged down the path he had fled down yesterday. He didn't like fear, so he had to make sure the thing wasn't experiencing it either.

* * *

The twins clung to the seats for dear life, their Bone Buggy being shaken back and forth by the rogue Gorgo. Their space within the vehicle was decreasing much faster with the roof bent completely inwards. Finally the vivosaur grew tired of the shaking, and simply threw the car into the rocky wall.

The great crash and following bounces tossed the teens around, but luckily only bruised them a bit. Most of the broken glass had fallen outwards, thank goodness. But the dashboard was still plenty painful to bang into.

Grumbling, Tria climbed up the seat to the window above her. The Bone Buggy had landed on its side. That Gorgo really did hate them.

The brute had moved on to Roland's Bone Buggy for the time being. It was probably drawn to the screaming. After all, Jura had managed not to be a complete wuss when they were attacked.

Speaking of the little bugger, he hadn't said anything in awhile. Craning her neck, Tria peered beneath her to where her sibling had been seated. Her heart almost stopped. Why wasn't he there?

She peeked back out the window, checking the entire area for her stupid brother. Finally, a bit of spiky red hair caught her attention. Oh gosh. He was hiding in a bush behind the Gorgo. Apparently he'd tried to make a run for it, but was cut off when the Gorgo moved.

"Freaking moron..." Tria sighed, fighting the urge to yell at Jura. He totally deserved it, but perhaps having him getting eaten alive was a bit of an overreaction.

Suddenly, the purple vivosaur stopped its assault, nostrils flaring as its head turned. Jura visibly cringed and ducked deeper into his bush. Like that would help. Picking up on the movement, the Gorgo charged towards the undergrowth, maw spread wide. Tria ducked back into the buggy, a bit reluctant to watch her sibling be chewed up.

However, instead of screaming, there was a rather annoying, high-pitched roar. Kind of like that one little vivo- oh no.

Sure enough, the little red eyesore was standing, dwarfed and snarling, directly behind the Gorgo. The predator turned its head to get a better look at the significantly smaller vivosaur, obviously hoping for a better meal than Jura. Clearly disappointed, the Gorgo turned back to where said redhead had been, only to find he was gone.

Once again, Jura had tried to make a break for it. At least he was almost back to the Bone Buggy this time. Still, the Gorgo picked up on it, and immediately charged after him. It skidded to a stop, though, once a tiny pair of jaws had latched onto its thigh. Growling with frustration, the brute easily shook off the small reptile.

By then, Jura had began climbing back into the vehicle, Tria making sure to help pull him back in. Gall, this was stressful. _And_ she was starving. When all this worked out somehow, she was definitely going to have a feast to help with recovery.

With one last tug, her lanky brother tumbled in through the window and into the slightly safer interior of the buggy. And not a moment too soon. Once again, the blue skies were replaced with wet, purple flesh as the Gorgo's jaws descended upon the car.

Another obnoxious roar caught their attacker's attention, who begrudgingly released the Bone Buggy and turned around once more. There was silence for a moment, and Tria wa surprised to find she was holding her breath. Then roars broke out, a new, deeper one joining in.

Jura was too freaked out to speak his mind, so at least something was normal again. His twin could tell he was curious, so once again climbing back to the window, she took a quick peek to see what the ruckus was about. Probably just a second vivosaur coming to eat- holy smokes.

A larger, spikier version of that annoying small vivosaur was standing in front of the Gorgo, enraged. Though still a bit smaller than the powerful carnivore, the red vivosaur seemed to have a spark in its eyes.

Lunging forward, the smaller vivosaur latched on to the Gorgo's neck, twisting his body and using his weight to slam it to the ground. Rolling, the Gorgo snapped its jaws up at the slimmer reptile, who arched his back to dodge. Staggering away after the leap, the bright red vivosaur struggled to regain its balance, while the Gorgo writhed around on the ground, desperately trying to snag its claws on the ground.

Balance was regained and claws dug into dirt simultaneously, and the two vivosaurs charged each other once again. However, just before they could collide, the red vivosaur dug a foot into the ground and gyrated, spiked tail slamming into the Gorgo's jaw. It roared in pain, reeling away as blood dribbled from its tooth. The blow must have aggravated the previous wound from the Captain's Spino ST.

Roaring and taking in aggressive step forward, the smaller vivosaur sent a powerful glare towards the Gorgo. It seemed to debate lunging, but the pain in its tooth was enough to make it turn tail and run off. Snorting, the red vivosaur stood up a little straighter, only to flash suddenly and flop to the ground awkwardly in his original, tiny form.

Grinning, Tria dropped back down into the Bone Buggy, foot resting on the gearshift as she craned her neck to look at Jura. "Hey, the Gorgo's gone!"

Slightly disbelieving eyes slowly creaked open in response. "Really?" An affirming nod sent the redhead climbing back up to his feet. "Great! Let's get out of here and back to the park."

Hands planted firmly on either side of the window, and Tria hauled herself through. She stood on the side of the vehicle, holding out a hand to help Jura out after her. He could not crawl out the bottom window like he had before, since the Gorgo had rocked the Buggy enough to block it off.

With one last heave, Jura scrambled out and flopped down on the blue, metal car, exhausted. His sibling rolled her eyes, jumped down to the ground and checking herself over for injuries. Other than a few scratches on her arms from the shattered window, she was fairly unscathed. That was lucky.

"Hey, Jura! You got any cuts?" Tria yelled, cupping her hands around her mouth. Groaning, Jura rolled off the decimated Bone Buggy, clumsily landing on his feet. He quickly scrutinized himself just as she had, though with a bit more focus to detail.

"Just a few up my arms and legs," he concluded, wiping off said appendages. He looked around, obviously confused, then suddenly his eyes widened. "Hold on, where's Roland?"

An exasperated moan. "Gosh darn it. I totally forgot about that guy." Hands resting on her hips, Tria looked over in the direction of Roland's beat up Buggy. "How much do you wanna bet he's dead?"

Jura glowered at her, arms folding crossly. Man, he really couldn't take a joke. Shaking her head, Tria walked up to the dented door of Roland's vehicle and pulled it back. Sure enough, shaking inside of it with his eyes closed and face covered was Roland.

Sniggering, Tria rested a hand on the door frame and leaned against it, earning a protesting groan from the metal. "Dude, that Gorgo's long gone. Quit being such a whimp."

It took a few moments of impatient waiting for Roland to realize the imminent threat had fled. Or rather, that Tria was towering over him. Hands eventually slid off of his eyes, and the pudgy brunet looked up at her questioningly.

"Why'd it leave? Not that I'm complaining," Roland asked in a hushed tone. Gesturing over to the red vivosaur Jura was cradling, Tria slouched over a bit. She was too hungry for answering questions properly.

"That little eyesore turned into a huge eyesore and whooped its butt," Tria grumbled. He appeared just as confused, if not more, than he had before her explanation. But, the intimidating vibe from Tria was overpowering his curiosity. And that was just how she wanted it.

It wasn't but a minute before a huge, silver Bone Buggy came rolling in from who knows where. It stopped, and Liu Ren hopped out. He was probably coming to see if they were dead.

"Hey, Liu Ren!" Tria yelled, waving at him, "Where the heck have you been? That stupid Gorgo almost killed us!"

He appeared apologetic, and maybe a bit embarrassed. "Well, the emergency alert doesn't come in until your Bone Buggy is demolished, and none of you called in for help."

"_And the speed of that lug had nothing to do with it, I'm sure," _Tria thought to herself sarcastically. She probably would have said it aloud, had it not been for the watchful glare of her brother. He always did have to ruin her fun.

Liu Ren appeared to size up the damage, deciding whether or not it would be worth trying to fix the vehicles out there. He disappeared for a moment behind the buggies, the clanging of metal confirming that he was messing with the vehicles. Eventually the brightly dressed man emerged, Dino Gears in hand. He gave Tria Racer and Maisy's gears, Jura Jack's gear, and Roland Tops' gear.

"Well, your Buggies are wrecked and need to be towed," Liu Ren started, receiving a 'no, really' look from Tria. Roland and Jura, not so much. Clearing his throat, the black haired man continued. "On the brightside, your Dino Gears are just fine."

Upon hearing that, Tria turned and looked over to her brother, whose face was scrunched up. Must be his Alxas screaming again. She really appreciated that Alxas. He made everything so much more entertaining.

Roland, eyes glued to his gear, awkwardly rubbed at the back of his head. "That's fine and all, but what are we supposed to do in the meantime?"

Tria was surprised to find that she indeed agreed with that question, and took to staring expectantly up at Liu Ren. He appeared to know a good answer, though. In fact, he had that knowledgeable air to him that he'd had during the driving lessons.

"The Captain asked that you pursue and defeat the Gorgo," he replied confidently, arms folded behind his back. "That small vivosaur did quite a number to it, so if you hurry the battle shouldn't be too difficult."

Eyes shifted over to the red vivosaur seated next to Jura, who was absentmindedly scratching at his head with his foot. Tria couldn't help but snicker just a bit. That vivosaur really didn't make much sense.

"Right! Guess we better get on that!" Tria announced, smacking her hands together. The boys didn't seem to agree with her, not that she cared, but Liu Ren nodded approvingly and headed back to his Bone Buggy after picking up Jura's look-alike in vivosaur form.

The minute he slammed the door, protests arose. "Tria, why are you agreeing to this?" Jura whined, sharing an apprehensive glance with Roland. They were probably just wimping out over having the 'muscle' leaving. Clearly, they just needed some reassurance from her.

"Because. Captain said so," she replied simply, patting both boys on the back. Her sibling rolled his eyes, muttering something about their parents under his breath. At least Roland knew better.

The brunet scratched the back of his head tentatively. "Y-yeah, but isn't this, you know, dangerous?" His light blue eyes reflected worry that Tria scoffed at.

"We'll be fine. That stupid Gorgo doesn't stand a chance against our vivosaurs."

* * *

It didn't take too long for the three of them to track down said stupid Gorgo. There was a pretty nice blood trail for the first ten yards or so, then the brightly colored, huge vivosaur was hunched over in the most obvious spot along the beach, no cover whatsoever. Basically, that thing was smart to a certain extent. Tria could relate to that.

So, the three Wardens-in-training stood behind the massive, injured carnivore, trying to decide how to go about attacking the brute. It was already hard enough for Jura and Tria to decide who would be fighting the Gorgo, but Roland's sympathy towards it was screwing everything up.

"Are you sure about this, guys?" he murmured, staring at the Gorgo in his usual unconfident manner, "I-I mean, it does look pretty tired."

Tria snorted, turning to face the brunet whilst pointing at the vivosaur. "Tired my butt. It just got whacked in the face. Besides, even if it was tired, that thing could easily eat any one of us in one bite."

"I've gotta go with Tria on this one, that Gorgo _is_ pretty nasty," Jura added in, a hint of worry to his voice. His sister nodded eagerly; it was nice to have the smart one agree with her for once.

"Then it's settled," she affirmed, shoving Jura and Roland towards the Gorgo, "Go kick its butt!"

"Wait, what!?"

Upon hearing the yelling behind it, the Gorgo spun around, roaring at the trio. The boys both cringed, but managed to hold their ground. Holding Dino Gears had that kind of effect on people.

"A-are we really gonna do this?" Roland stammered, shaking. He was barely able to keep his hold on Tops' gear. Jura, though equally apprehensive about their situation, gave him a reassuring pat on the back.

"I'm sure we'll survive this."

A red and a blue dino gear spun through the air, each flashing into an Alxas and Tricera respectively. Jack flexed his claws, letting out a rather broken roar that sounded more like a scream than anything else. Tops winced at the noise, shaking his bulky head to divert the ringing in his ears.

Jack was, obviously, the fastest of the three vivosaurs, which Jura was aware of. The only problem was the lack of a Bone Buggy to tell him what attacks the Alxas could use. He just sorted of stood there, sweating, clueless as to what he could say.

"Jura, just do something already!" Tria urged, in a backseat-driver type of way. He tugged at his neckerchief with a finger, clearly trying to figure something out.

Eventually a light seemed to flash on in his head, and he pointed at the Gorgo. "Jack, Claw Strike!"

Claws flexing once again, the Alxas charged forward, his arms positioned horizontally in front of him. Then, upon reaching the Gorgo, he thrust both arms forward, claws digging into its scaly hide and making it stagger backwards. Quickly doing a u-turn, Jack shot back to Tops' left side, cackling manically.

Enraged, the Gorgo hurtled at Jack in retaliation, fire licking its teeth. It swung its whole head at the brightly colored vivosaur, jaws opening wide to enclose around him. However, the Alxas easily jumped out of the way, causing the pinkish brute to stumble once more.

Seeing the obvious gap, Roland chimed in. "A-alright, Tops, use Piercing Lunge!"

The powerful Tricera jogged the the Gorgo, lowering his heavy head and swinging it powerfully upward. His three horns jabbed into the off-balance vivosaur's chin, throwing it into a rather awkward upward stance. It struggled to stay upright, fighting gravity's attempt to pull it to the ground back first.

"Face Ripper!" Jura exclaimed suddenly, his mind working a mile a minute. Tria shot him a confused look, wondering why he was calling a different attack when he had trouble remembering the first one.

The confusion lifted almost instantly as Jack raked his claws over the Gorgo's exposed abdomen, earning a painful roar. The brutish vivosaur slammed to the ground, struggling to get back up. Jack broke out in taunting cackles, which were hastily rewarded by a powerful bite from the Gorgo, who had gotten up faster than expected. It latched onto his left arm, tossing him to the side with ease.

Before the Gorgo could continue its assault, Tops ran in and threw it back into that awkward stance with a second Piercing Lunge. At this point, it was obviously weakened significantly. It shook as it tried not to fall over. However, it seemed to have just enough energy to let out one huge, Fearsome Roar.

The other two vivosaurs immediately began to stumble around, almost as if they were dizzy. Tops turned around completely, whereas Jack stood up straighter than Jura thought was possible. Both of them still seemed off balance, though.

Still, Jura was feeling a bit more confident about Jack now. His sister could tell. He was, after all, smiling just a bit now. Even if Fossil Battles were kind of stressful for him, he did enjoy them.

"C'mon, bro, finish that son of a gun off!" Tria cheered, giving him a playful shove. He looked back at her, obviously apprehensive now, but he still managed a weak smile.

He spun around, eyes focused on the Gorgo. "Okay, Jack! One more Face Ripper!"

An almost trilling purr responded, drawing attention back to Jack. He was clumsily walking in circles, almost drunkenly, chasing his tail. The redhead's hand smacked against his face, and he groaned.

"Jack!" The Dizzy vivosaur looked up at his Fighter, mouth hanging open. Drool dripped out of the side of his maw. "Oh my gosh…"

"Jura! It's recovering!" Roland squeaked, pointing to their carnivorous enemy who was beginning to get its weight shifted forward. Slowly, the painful upward stance was turning to a normal, hunched over once.

Starting to panic, Jura jogged over to his 9 foot tall vivosaur, shaking him harshly. "Jack! Would you go hit that thing!" He pointed to the Gorgo, still shaking the Alxas.

He cocked his head, processing what Jura was telling him to do. After a moment, he stumble-ran at the enemy, knocking his fighter over in the process. Then, with another of his scream-roars, he slashed at the Gorgo's stomach, flashing it into a crimson gear.

Jack then proceeded to stagger to the left, then to the right, then face-plant and return to his gear.

"He can't even turn into his gear like a normal vivosaur," Tria laughed, striding up to her sibling as he struggled up to his feet. Once Jura was up, he brushed himself off indignantly and quickly collected Jack and the Gorgo's gears.

Roland let out a long, loud sigh of relief as he slouched slightly. "Oh man…We actually did it." He wiped the sweat from his forehead, standing up straight again as a smile twitched on to his face. "I have to admit, I'm feeling a tiny bit more confident now!"

"That's the spirit, Roland!" Tria butted in, putting her arm around his neck. She shook him a bit in a friendly manner, moving over to her brother and doing the same thing. "Now let's go get some food! I am literally starving right now."

Jura tapped at his chin, concerned. "Shouldn't we report in to the Captain first? I mean, he did want us to-"

"All in favor of getting food first, raise your hand."

And, of course, Roland raised his hand along with Tria. She smirked, hands on her hips. "Well, that settles it. Food first, Captain second."

Sighing, Jura hung his head in defeat. There was no use in arguing with her, especially when it came to food. "Fine. I'd just like to point out that this wouldn't be necessary if you'd had breakfast."

A snort. "Who are you, my mom?"

* * *

**I'm sorry, I procrastinated again and every time I do that it takes me like a month to go through my laziness cycle and actually get working. Though this time, I had a legitimate distraction. I've had this story idea for awhile, not fanfiction but original idea type of thing, and writing like a page of it actually got me back on track with this. XD**

**Anyways, I would say that I'll try to get the next chapter out faster, but I said that last time too, so let's not get anyone's hopes up. I'll get it up when I can. Hopefully once I get through all this initial Warden stuff and actually get into plot important things, these will get going faster.**

**Oh yeah, I also finally got this done because I started working on it during school, since we have chromebooks. I'd try to get back into A Change of Pace, but every time I sit down to work on it during school, I feel weird about writing Cole's hipster dialogue. XD So we'll just have to see.**


	7. Tests and Pals

Getting up to Stryker's office took much longer than anticipated. Obviously, the three of them had gotten something to eat first, and that had taken pretty long. Then there was the need to see Prof. Little for minor first aid, which really didn't seem like a need, but he insisted it was.

Finally, after around two hours of what felt like stalling, Jura, Tria, and Roland made it up to see the Captain. It was pretty dark in there, what with it being after dark, but the lights helped a little bit. Not much. Stryker appeared vaguely concerned, though that was probably because it had taken them forever to get up there.

Still, he started smiling almost immediately. "You three have done well, especially seeing as that Gorgo wasn't as weak as we thought it was."

"Yeah, thanks for that," Tria grumbled, causing Jura to quickly elbow her in the side. She really needed to get better about respecting people, especially the Captain.

Stryker paused, probably a bit surprised at the siblings' interaction, but soon continued eagerly. "Jura and Tria, you two have done exceptionally well, having faced that Gorgo twice and repelling it both times."

Jura seemed to emanate joy from the praise, whereas his sister appeared more smug than anything. She probably thought that the compliment was overdue. What a moron.

Still, Tria's disrespectful nature was the least of his concerns. Shaking the Captain's words from his head, the redhead politely crossed his arms behind his back. "S-so, about that little vivosaur-"

"No need to worry," the Captain dismissed with a wave of his hand, "For now, all you need to know is that he's safe and sound."

Well, that was a relief. Giving a gracious nod, Jura exhaled loudly and smiled. That vivosaur, while a bit annoying for looking a lot like him, _had_ saved his life. He'd feel bad if he didn't ask about it.

"But, back to the more important matters."

What could possibly be more important than the Gorgo attack?"

"You see, while you three were doing an excellent job at rogue management, the other candidates have already finished their Warden Tests."

Oh.

Tugging at his bandanna, Jura swallowed hard. "We'll get on that first thing tomorrow, Captain, I promise."

Stryker nodded confidently, rising from his seat and giving each one of them a pat on the back. "Good! I expect great things from each of you."

The three of them were then ushered out of the room just in time to see Prof. Little slip in. He looked sort of nervous. It was probably nothing to worry about. Maybe.

Standing within the elevator, both Roland and Jura exhaled in almost perfect unison. The looked to each other, mildly surprised at each other. Then, the started laughing.

Jura couldn't help but grin. Maybe Roland wasn't so bad after all. He did seem to have a bit more sense to him than Tria or Nate, and he certainly knew when to be respectful.

Roland spoke up first. "Holy noodles! I can't believe the Captain's impressed with us!" His voice quivered with nervousness, but his eyes shone with excitement.

Nodding, Jura felt a bit of exuberance jolt through him suddenly, his stance reflecting it clearly. "I know! We're gonna pass the Warden Test for sure now!"

"I don't know what I was so worried about," the brunet started slowly, glancing at each of the twins awkwardly, "With you two around, there's no way we can lose!"

A hand smacked sharply into Roland's shoulder, making Jura cringe. Tria strode up beside the plump teen, a smirk on her face. "Hey! Don't sell ol' Tops short! He's a killer!"

"You're not so bad yourself," Jura added, giving their friend a thumbs-up. Beaming, Roland rubbed the back of his neck bashfully.

"I mean, I'm not _that_ great…"

"Sure you are! You knew what move of Tops' to use to put that Gorgo into that bad stance without a Bone Buggy for direction! If that's not great, I don't know what is." Jura's words seem to have stuck, and Roland was left speechless and sort of red in the face. The door to the elevator finally opened up with a _ding_. Laughing, Tria punched the brunet on the shoulder and took off running, leaving the two boys to exit by themselves.

Waving goodbye to Roland, Jura headed off towards his and Tria's room whilst uttering a "See you tomorrow!" in parting. Upon arriving to his shared quarters, he found his sister was already taking a shower, which basically meant he had to wait out the next half-hour doing whatever until she was done.

Flopping down on his back on top of his bed, the redhead decided to think over what they had to do for the Warden Test. Bring in a vivosaur, which would probably be their Tarbo, Racer, in order to avoid conflict, and fight their way through. That didn't seem like such a big deal.

Then there was, of course, actually being a Warden. Maybe they'd get assigned somewhere cool. Europe would be interesting, so long as Tria didn't try doing the accents of the people who lived there. Oh gosh, she totally would, never mind.

Snickering a bit to himself, Jura rolled on to his side to check the clock. 22:32. How had it gotten so late? Not much had happened that day, other than almost dying. Okay, maybe a lot had happened. It still seemed weird that it was that late.

After another few agonizingly long minutes, Tria finally came out of the shower. She was wearing that really old blue sweatshirt that was starting to turn orange and barely fit her anymore. At least the Coelo pattern pajama pants were sort of new.

"Alright, bro, go take your shower," the blunette grumbled, picking up the blankets next to her bed. She face-planted into her pillow, lazily yanking the covers half over her.

"Did you leave any hot water?"

"No clue."

Sighing, Jura just stared at his sister's sprawled out figure. She was already wearing him out. Maybe they would get assigned to different parts of the world, get some space from each other. That would be awesome. Picking up his T-Rex themed pajamas, which were _completely_ age appropriate, the redhead pushed the idea from his mind. He had more important things to worry about than Warden assignments, like washing his hair. Growing it long and spiky had its drawbacks.

* * *

Morning came all too fast, and the Gorgo incident from the day before was starting to take its toll on Jura. His entire body was sore. So, on his way down to breakfast, he stopped in to see Prof. Little, who was more than happy to give him some ibuprofen in exchange for a little segment on what the Gorgo attack had been like.

Unfortunately, Jura's popularity did not seem to last in the cafeteria. Dahlia had, as per usual, pulled all attention to herself, describing in explicit detail how awesome her and Penny's test had gone. It was loud, filled with plenty of gestures and table banging. No one dared change the conversation.

After about twenty minutes of her lively story, Jura felt as though his socialness for the day had been drained. He finished up the last of his eggs and headed back into the main lobby, patiently waiting for his sister and Roland to show up. Hopefully they would not be too much longer.

The sound of Tria's shoes banging on the metal floor came first, followed closely by Roland yelling nervously as he tried not to trip while running.

"Yo, Jura! Let's go kick some butt!" Tria exclaimed, hands balling into fists out of excitement. Roland caught up finally, panting but looking equally eager.

"Sounds like a plan!" Jura replied quickly, a grin flashing on to his face. "Oh, and before I forget, we're going to use Racer for the Warden Test. It's more fair than just using one of our Vivosaurs."

His sister seemed to want to argue with his decision, but it seemed her eagerness to be in a fossil battle overruled it. For once, her excitement actually came in handy. Who would've thought.

Roland also seemed relieved. "Well, I guess we're ready to go to the Fossil Stadium now," he added with a nervous smile of his own.

Tria took that as a cue to start heading that way, and immediately bolted off. The boys followed shortly after, though they were walking. It wouldn't end well if Roland tipped.

The lobby of the stadium had metal floors similar to the ones in HQ, except the entire area was much larger. A single, circular reception desk sat in the center, while on the back wall there were two large screens adjacent to each other. It was a bit too spacious for the amount of people there, and was actually hauntingly quiet, but Jura assumed the space was meant for when huge tournaments took place, and none of those would be happening any time soon. The school year had just begun, after all.

Approaching the lady manning the desk, Jura glanced over to his energetic sibling briefly before checking in for the test. The only thing they really had to do was designate their vivosaur, Racer, before they were waved toward the door leading out to the arena.

The Stadium was a light green with the Warden logo inscribed in it in yellow. However, the arena itself was huge. If there had been a crowd there, which there obviously wasn't since there was not a tournament, they would have looked like colorful ants.

Tria drove them up to their side of the stadium slowly, which Jura greatly appreciated. Roland joined them seconds later in his lime green buggy. Liu Ren sure had fixed up their Bone Buggies efficiently. You could hardly tell they'd been wrecked the day before.

A couple more buggies pulled up across from them, making sure to leave plenty of room for the vivosaurs to fight. Jura could already feel himself shaking. Definitely from excitement. He wasn't worried one bit.

The fighters they were pinned against failed to contact them for one reason or another, and two dino gears exploded on to the field. One took on the form of a small red quadruped, around four feet long, with a large sail covered in intricate white markings. The second was a huge blue theropod, about 40 feet long and 10 feet tall, with silvery plates covering its body.

Tria slammed her hand into their monitor, and Racer was launched out, followed shortly by Tops. With a bright flash, the powerful Tarbo materialized. While he was a bit shorter in length than the Big Allo, the blue vivosaur, he was a few feet taller. His dark purple skin looked ominous in comparison to the other brightly colored vivos, and his red eyes added to the effect. The gold crest and various spikes seemed to give him an air of power.

And suddenly, the battle was starting. The small red vivosaur, a Dimetro, darted forward, leaping up at Racer and nipping at his neck. Snarling, the Tarbo shook himself free of the sailed reptile, which flopped to the ground and crawled back to its teammate's side, snickering.

"Awesome! Our turn!" Tria cheered, checking the monitor. A single attack showed up, since they only had one part for Racer. Rolling down the window, the blunette yelled, "Tail Bash, man!"

Racer shot her a confused look back.

"Jura, what the heck is going on?"

Cringing at his sister's tone, but still annoyed that she didn't understand the problem, the redhead sighed and pointed at the monitor. "We don't have enough FP to use that attack."

Her jaw dropped. Man, she really didn't pay attention during any of their classes. "What're you saying?"

"We can't attack this turn, give him an LP shot and pass." Man she was gonna be ticked. Sure enough, Tria's mauve eyes filled with frustration, and she crossed her arms.

"I don't wanna admit to that, you do it," she insisted stubbornly, squeezing her eyes shut. Groaning, but not arguing with her demand, Jura hit the LP shot button and pressed the button on the monitor to pass. Sure enough, the screen changed to a map of the battlefield once again.

Seeing that its turn had come, the Big Allo lunged forward suddenly, maw closing around Racer's neck and yanking him around. Letting out a roar of pain, the purple vivosaur brought his huge head upward, knocking the Big Allo loose. It staggered away, quickly regaining its balance. And yet, it didn't look nearly as winded as Racer.

Jura looked over to Tops, waiting to see what Roland had decided. The Tricera scratched his foot on the ground, charging towards the sneaky Dimetro. His horns scooped up the much smaller vivosaur, tossing it up into the air. It crashed to the ground bodily, writhing up to its feet.

Smiling at the choice of attack, Jura focused on the Dimetro. With the good type match-up, that was sure to have done a good chunk of damage. However, the little bugger still seemed determined to use its good match-up with Racer to the best of its ability. It went in for another bite.

Leaping once again, the Dimetro latched on to Racer's shoulder, earning yet another painful roar. Weakened, especially since he was not too strong to begin with thanks to his single part, the Tarbo struggled to keep his balance, legs trembling with effort.

Suddenly, Tria was shouting a command. "Tail Bash, c'mon Racer!"

With one mighty heave, Racer whipped around, causing the eyesore on his flank to lose its grip. A large tail soon followed the Dimetro, slamming into it and launching it at its fighter's Bone Buggy. Crashing on to the hood, the sneaky devil exploded into light and reverted back to its crimson gear.

Jura felt his heart skip a beat, but out of sheer pleasant surprise. With a wide grin, he high-fived his sister. They were actually gonna do this. They were gonna win and be Wardens.

But, the battle wasn't done yet. The Big Allo, starting to look nervous since its teammate's defeat, charged towards Racer. His health was already low enough, he probably wouldn't survive another hit.

Slamming the LP again, Jura managed to get two shots to their vivosaur before the Big Allo spun around and smacked Racer in the side. He grunted, stumbling away but staying upright. Letting out a relieved sigh, Jura leaned against the dashboard. He'd actually done something right for once.

In fact, it seemed their opponent had screwed up this time. The Big Allo was now facing away from them, looking quite vulnerable. That was an opening. Hopefully Roland would have his Tricera attack before the theropod had turn back around.

Sure enough, the lumbering quadruped began to charge. He started slow, gradually building up speed. Jura took that moment to spam the 'Atk' button. Tops' strides noticeably increased in power. Finally, his large horns rammed into the Allo's butt. The force caused it to fall forward, face-planting into the green arena. With a flash, it reverted back to a white gear.

"Alright!" Tria grinned, hands gripping the steering wheel extra hard as she started kicking her legs."We're halfway done! And Racer's really killing it!"

While the Tarbo had briefly returned to his Dino Gear, he was still close enough to hear Tria's praise. Gurgled growls filled their heads, almost sounding like bashful grumbling. It was sort of… cute.

"_You guys are so nice…" _Racer mumbled, his voice surprising childish and quiet for one so fierce-looking. "_I'd give you a big hug if my arms weren't so small!"_

"Thanks, Racer…" Jura tittered. Man, talking to Racer was a lot more awkward than he'd thought it would be. Then again, it _was_ better than talking to Jack.

"_YEAH, RACER, YOU ROCK!" _Oh gosh no.

Eyes squeezing shut, Jura tried desperately to block out the loud-mouthed opinions of his Alxas. He could hear Tria laughing in the background once again. It was good to know she was so supportive.

Thankfully, the sound of VR-00M reloading support shots suddenly erased Jack's voice. The same with Racer's. The next battle must have been close to starting.

A couple more Bone Buggies drove up, each almost instantly launching out their vivosaurs. This battle was already looking more fast-paced than the last. In fact, one of the vivosaurs, around 20 feet long and about Jura's height, looked quite speedy itself. Black and red with large frills around its neck, the theropod looked quite vicious.

The second vivosaur was bright green with pink plates running down its back. Roughly the same size as Roland's Tricera, the Stego seemed to be the slower of the two, and probably would not be as hard to deal with as its teammate, a Dilopho.

Racer and Tops exploded on to the field moments later, each rejuvenated from their break. Their feet had hardly touched the ground when the Dilopho charged Racer, biting at his neck like the Dimetro had done. However, it had built up much more speed, so its momentum caused the bite to knock the Tarbo back a bit. Then, suddenly, the fast-footed biped was back where it had started.

Once again, they had to pass Racer's turn due to a lack of FP. Man, that was frustrating. Then, of course, Roland's Tricera being the massive brute he was, just about anything was faster than him, even the Stego.

With a surprising amount of strength, the plated vivosaur leaped into the air. It began to spin rapidly, almost like a wheel, and shot straight at Racer. Plates digging into his shoulder, ripping a nasty gash, the Tarbo probably would have fallen right over had it not been for the last second LP shot from Jura. Still, he was definitely weakened from the hit. Raspy, pained breaths escaped his maw.

However, the Stego seemed to be in an equally problematic situation. While the wheel-like attack had done a good number on Racer, it was stuck in a crouched position that it was having trouble getting out of. With its legs struggling to hold it up, they would not be able to brace for an attack very well.

Luckily, Roland was definitely a ton more in tune with things like that than he let on. Tops was on that Stego in a second, his powerful body slamming full-force into it. With a shriek, the Stego flashed back to his gear. Huh, that was a lot more effective than he'd thought it would be.

The Dilopho shrieked, its cry causing both of its opponents to cringe. With their guard down just a bit, the frilled vivosaur charged Racer once more, teeth latching to his neck. Surprisingly, he took the hit, barely standing but still managing nonetheless. That was their chance.

Tria was all too happy to command the final blow. "Tail Bash! Launch that sucker!"

For all its speed and strength, that Dilopho sure couldn't take a hit. Racer's tail plowed into it, launching it like a home-run hit. Halfway back to its fighter's buggy, it reverted down to its dino gear.

And that was it. They'd done it.

* * *

"Now, if you two could just stand still for a second- Oh, there we go!"

A flash temporarily blinded Jura.

"Nice! Well, here are your Warden Licenses!"

The lady from the reception desk happily held out two devices shaped like credit cards. One had a picture of Roland on it, and the other an image of Jura and Tria, both uncomfortably pushed against each other to fit inside of the square. They both had an E in the lower right-hand corner. Jura took their card, frustration rising within him.

Trying his best to be polite despite his foul mood, the redhead gingerly held up the license. "Hey, how come Tria and I are on the same license?" Please be a mistake, please be a mistake.

"Well, according to the Captain, you two have a joint license." Nonononono.

"What the heck do you mean by 'joint license'?!" Tria interrupted, not afraid to vocalize her anger. Which wasn't necessarily a bad thing for once.

However, before the clerk could continue, a very familiar and very obnoxious voice yelled from across the room, "Jura, Tria, you guys killed it out there!" Fantastic.

The three of them turned to see Nate shooting up to them, a huge grin on his face. Penny was close behind him, which surprised Jura a little bit. They'd probably became friends at some point, otherwise she wouldn't be in a hurry.

Tria's attention immediately diverted to Nate. "Heck yeah we did! Racer may have need a ton of FP to attack, but boy did he throw down!"

"Well, we couldn't have done it without Roland," Jura added in. "His Tricera did most of the work."

While Roland seemed to be grateful for the comment, and was bashfully taking it in, the two excited teens seemed to ignore it completely. Their conversation continued as though Jura hadn't said anything.

"I won too, which means we're all gonna be Wardens!" Nate exclaimed, cheering ecstatically with Tria as they high-fived. Unfortunately for Jura, Penny was being sucked into the conversation as well thanks to their high energy levels.

"I can hardly believe I passed as well, it's a dream come true!" the blonde interrupted, smiling wide. Surprisingly, the two actually stopped to listen to her. Jura wasn't sure if he should have been offended by that.

More shoes banged against the metal floors. Jura didn't even have to look to know who was there. "Yo, Tria! Did you guys pass?"

"Heck yeah we did!" his sister yelled back to Dahlia, shooting her a thumbs-up, which the redhead reciprocated.

Dahlia's attention quickly switched over to Penny. "Hey Penny, bossman's handing out assignments real soon, wanna head over with me?"

The pink clad girl glanced between Nate and Tria, who had gone back to chatting eagerly about stuff they were gonna do as Wardens. Rolling her eyes, but in a friendly sort of way, she ducked between the two of them and followed after Dahlia.

Well, assignments sure beat listening to his sister and Nate bragging about themselves. Turning towards the door and motioning for Roland to follow, Jura decided to head off to HQ. Maybe Stryker would have something cool to tell them.

* * *

Surprisingly, Stryker had been waiting for everyone in his office. That was a first. Normally some of them were there before he showed up. Maybe he didn't have anything better to do, so he just went right to his office.

Whatever the reason, he was there, and Tria and Nate were kind of late. That's what they get for ignoring people. Mainly Jura. He was still a little butthurt over that.

Still, Stryker seemed to be willing to forgive their tardiness, as always, and went on ahead with his little speech. "Congratulations on passing your Warden Tests! From this day forth, you're all officially members of the Wardens"

A soft ding went off throughout the room, which Jura was certain had come from his Warden License. He pulled the device out of his pocket and sure enough, it had. Their current rank had gone up to 2. Everyone else's had as well. That must have been their first official accomplishments as Wardens - becoming them.

"As Wardens, you're free to enter the fossil stadium and compete in any tournaments held there. I have faith that all of you will perform well in them." Stryker paused, allowing everyone to calm down again. A few people, mainly Nate and Tria, had started chatting for some reason after the rank up thing. Jura was certain his sister would find any excuse to goof off.

But this time, she stopped talking as soon as she realized the Captain had. That was surprisingly effective. Seeing that the teens were all focused on him again, the brunet continued. "Now then, time for your assignments."

An excited buzz seemed to fill the air, despite no one talking.

"Leon." The purple haired teen glanced up at Stryker, surprised to see he was being singled out. The Captain smiled at him knowingly. "You'll be assigned to Fossil Park America."

For once, Leon seemed pleased with his decision. "America, huh? Perfect."

Nodded happily, Stryker turned to Dahlia, whose eyes lit up. "Dahlia, you're assigned to Fossil Park Europe."

"HECK YES!" the gearhead cheered, throwing a fist into the air. Everyone cringed at her volume, especially Jura. It was like listening to Jack. "Bone Buggies and no speed limits, here I come!"

Once again, the Captain looked quite pleased that his choice was approved of. "Alright, there are veteran Wardens waiting at your respective branches. Head over to your posts as soon as possible."

"See ya', suckers!" Dahlia shouted as she bolted to the elevator. Leon, trying his best to seem as edgy as possible, followed after her slowly, though a big grin was still on his face.

"Oh, and remember, the World Gate to get to your posts is by the elevator!" Stryker yelled after them as the doors to said elevator slid shut. Seems he'd forgotten a bit. Oh well, they'd probably find their way over just fine.

"Right…" Clearing his throat to regain his commanding air, the Captain briefly straightened his coat before continuing. "Penny, Nate, and Roland, you three will remain here at Warden HQ and help out with Fossil Park Asia."

"We'll do our best!" Roland beamed. Nate didn't seem as ecstatic about not being stationed at a different park, but he'd probably get over it. Dahlia and Leon's excitement was just getting to him.

Finally, the moment of truth had arrived. Jura shifted his feet nervously. Would he and Tria get assigned to different areas? Were they going to be sent out to another park together? Well, maybe they wouldn't get sent out. Stryker would have sent them with Dahlia or Leon then. Hmm…

"Jura and Tria…" Oh boy. "You'll be working for me. I'll be sending you out to wherever you're needed around the world."

Wait, what did that mea-

"No flipping way!" Nate shouted suddenly, giving Jura a hard smack on the back. "Talk about sweet gigs! You guys get to work for the Captain himself!"

Penny patted Jura's shoulder soothingly, probably trying to counteract Nate's harshness. "I'll be rooting for you two!"

"We'll rock this gig, trust me!" Tria grinned, resting an elbow on her much taller brother's shoulder. It still looked wonky, but for some reason it made Jura feel a bit better about their job. If his stupid sister was there, whatever they had to do couldn't be _that_ bad.

"Hey, uh, before I forget-" Stryker interrupted, once again looking a bit embarrassed. "-I should probably tell you a bit about Paleo Pals."

He'd forgotten something again. Which, really, only made Jura feel more connected with the Captain. He was probably busy constantly, it was probably a wonder he remembered to come to half these Warden candidate meetings. Maybe that's why he was always late…

"What are those?" Nate asked, sniggering a bit at the end. Tria started laughing too. That better not have been the joke Jura thought it was.

Luckily, Stryker seemed to not have noticed the laughter. Either that or he ignored it. "Paleo Pals are companions who fight and excavate alongside you. If you're close with someone, you should register each other as Paleo Pals so you can dig and battle together."

"Now, you all probably don't have Paleo Pals yet, so why don't you register each other?"

That seemed like a pretty reasonable idea. The five teens formed a circle, four of them taking out their Warden License devices. Jura figured that they probably did more than catalog ranks, and sure enough, they did. With a bit of experimenting, the group had sorted everything out.

The Paleo Pal pages were actually pretty neat. They could actually see each other's vivosaurs, or at least what was registered from the Warden Test. Penny had a Hypsi, Nate had an Edapho, and Roland obviously had his Tricera, Tops. Apparently his and Tria's listed vivosaur was their Tarbo, Racer.

Looking pretty happy with how things were going between the teens, Stryker proceeded to shoo off the excited kids. He was probably sick of hearing everyone giggling about Warden things they were gonna do, even though none of them knew what they were supposed to actually do. But, just as Jura and Tria were about to enter the elevator with their friends, the Captain spoke up.

"Jura, Tria, stay here for a bit, would you?"

* * *

***screams loudly into the void* I UPDATED BEFORE 2016. YES.  
**

**Man, I'm legit sorry that I am a lazy piece of crap. I got Yo-Kai Watch the day it came out, November 6th, so that actually took up a month and a half of my time since I wanted every Yo-Kai (I'm 1 short but it only spawns 1% of the time when you get streetpass, so I think I can get a pass on that), then I got Pokemon Super Mystery Dungeon the week before Christmas, then I agreed to draw some stuff which I procrastinated on by drawing other stuff and yeah. It was bad.**

**Basically, I will try to not take another 2+ months to update again. But most of you know where we're headed next since this is a fanfic, and I really wanna write that next place, so maybe we'll get a quick update. After I update _A Change of Pace_. I promised myself I'd update that next.**

**But yeah, hopefully this chapter was good and things didn't get too out of character. I haven't been thinking about this in like a month, so my mental images of these guys may have shifted.**


	8. Eyesores and Time Differences

"Is there no reasoning with this creature? Cease this foolishness at once!"

Prof. Little's voice reverberated throughout the room as the green haired boy entered into the Captain's office, the strange red vivosaur writhing around in his arms. Upon setting foot inside, he dropped the biped, allowing him to bolt over to Jura. Tria glanced over to her brother as he knelt down and began petting the creature, quite sick of the little eyesore already.

Stryker still hadn't explained to them what the heck they were doing in his office. Her stupid brother had been too intimidated by the guy to actually ask him and, well, she just didn't feel like doing it. So they'd been standing around in silence for the last ten minutes or so. At least Little livened up the party, and that was already shocking enough considering he was, well, a huge flipping nerd.

But it seemed that the Captain was ready to explain everything. _Finally._ "Jura, I've got a special mission for you, as well as your new partner." Oh look, Stryker was favoring her brother again. Big shocker. "You're going to be working with this vivosaur."

Never mind, she dodged a bullet there.

"Really?" Jura asked tentatively, a smile starting to twitch on to his face. He stopped petting the red vivosaur, who blinked a couple of times, probably confused as to why the attention had stopped.

Smiling, Stryker nodded. "I want you to help him experience the world firsthand." He paused to take in Jura's reaction. Seeing that it was still positive, he continued. "I know this is a lot to ask, but you may be the only one who can pull it off. Can I count on you?"

"Of course!" the redhead exclaimed, excitement flashing across his face. For once, Jura actually looked genuinely happy. He always tried to hide it, probably to seem more responsible, but it seemed… nice to see her brother so happy. Maybe having the eyesore around wouldn't be so bad.

The Captain sighed, relieved. "I knew you wouldn't let me down."

"Don't mess this up, Jura," Little chimed in, trying to sound encouraging but failing miserably. Man did that kid need some socialization.

Tria noticed that her brother was staring at that vivosaur. He had been for a while, almost like something was bothering him. His eyes lit up, and he pulled one of his many spare bandannas out of one of his many pouches.

"You already look a ton like me, so if you wanna complete the look, you're gonna need this," he smirked, holding the cloth out to the vivosaur. He sniffed at it gingerly, then looked up at his new fighter happily. Taking that as a sign of approval, Jura tied it around his neck, standing up to admire his handiwork. "Perfect."

"Aren't you going to name him?" Little inquired, a bit of nervousness to his tone. "No vivosaur is really bonded to a fighter if it doesn't have a name."

"Nibbles," Jura blurted out almost instantly. Tria started laughing seconds afterwards. That was a very, very lackluster name, and yet it was _so_ something he would say. It fit perfectly.

"Heh, I like it," Stryker chuckled, his intimidating air dropping. For some reason, he seemed less like some super important guy and more like a guy who did something important. There was definitely a difference between those two things.

"It fits like a covalent bond between two compatible atoms!" the Professor chimed in, earning a grin from Jura. Oh gosh, he understood what that meant? Man, sometimes she forgot her brother was also a huge nerd.

Stryker clasped his hands suddenly, the smack drawing attention back to him. His unapproachable-ness had returned. "Right then, you two. Time to talk about your first assignment."

"Finally!" Tria cheered, feeling her eagerness returning. It was time for her brother's spotlight to leave, thank goodness. She always did hate how everyone appreciated him.

A bit startled by her outburst, the Captain paused for just a second. "I want the two of you to visit the American branch of the Wardens. Get acquainted with the leader there and see if he needs help with anything."

"Yessir!" the blunette grinned, giving him a thumbs-up. Jura was too engrossed in Nibbles to really say anything. So, grabbing her sibling's sleeve, Tria yanked him up and led the way to the elevator.

"Remember, I'm counting on you!"

* * *

The elevator opened up, and standing outside talking were Nate, Penny, and Roland. Almost instantly Nate turned towards them. Finally, someone interesting.

"Hey Tria, I just saw Professor Boring Guy!" Nate shouted, obviously proud of that. While he didn't mean half of what he said, Tria always felt that pink haired weirdo said exactly what she was thinking. Hence why they were bros.

"He went into the elevator with that butt-biter from earlier and…" his eyes drifted to Nibbles, who had just stepped out of said elevator with Jura. "Holy moly! There he is! He's right there!"

Everyone's eyes went to Nibbles, even Tria's, and she knew he was there already. There was a confused pause, and then Penny was squealing and running up to him.

"Aww! He's so cute!" she smiled, reaching out to pet the vivosaur. Nate gasped and pulled her back, putting an arm in front of her to bar off Nibbles.

"Stay back! He's deadly!" he exclaimed, once again talking without thinking. "That ferocious beast tried to bite off my poor butt!" Almost instantly he stopped talking, face turning bright red. Man, he'd really screwed that up.

Penny rolled her eyes, pushing Nate's arm out of the way. "Yeah, right. He's way too cute to do that!" She crouched down, leaning closer to Nibbles as she started doing that pet-talk voice. "Aren't you? Aren't you just too cute?"

Nibbles growled suddenly and made a lunge at the blonde. Luckily, Jura realized what he was about to do and grabbed him before he could do any harm. Penny squeaked and fell back on her rear, obviously startled.

"C'mon, Nibbles, that's not how you react to that," Jura scolded, setting the red vivosaur back down and patting him on the head. Seeing that it was his fighter giving him attention, Nibbles let out a strange, happy purr.

Standing up and straightening out her skirt, Penny sighed, actually appearing to be quite hurt. Her pride, that is. "Oookay, then. Guess he hates me.

Nate patted her on the shoulder comfortingly. "It's okay, Penny. He hates everyone. Except Jura, apparently."

"Well, someone has to like him," Tria quipped, earning laughter from everyone but her brother. He really needed to work on laughing at himself. "I mean, that's why the Captain gave the little bugger to him."

"Oh, so he's yours then?"

Jura nodded eagerly, cheering up after enduring that sick burn. "Yeah, I'm supposed to introduce him to the world. Whatever that means."

"That sounds like a lot of responsibility," Roland piped up, his apprehensiveness rubbing off on Jura. It was like he'd just remembered that Stryker hadn't just said 'take this vivosaur since you like him'. Seeing the negative impact his comment had, the brunet quickly tried to cheer up the teen with a quick, "But I'm sure if anyone's up to it, it's you, Jura!"

"I just love the name Nibbles! It's perfect!" Penny added in for good measure. It seemed to help, since Jura didn't seem quite as dreary.

Then there was beeping. Nate pulled out his Warden License, reading something that had just been sent to them. Man, they really needed to rename those things. They did a lot more than make someone a Warden.

"Oops! We gotta split, guys!" the pink haired teen exclaimed, pocketing the device, "Look like the head honcho of the Asia branch needs to talk to us."

A brief wave was sent to the twins as Nate stepped back into the elevator. "See ya' around, Tria! And watch your butt, yeah?"

"See you, Jura and Nibbles!" Penny chimed in, following after Nate, Roland in her wake.

"Later!"

"See you around, losers!" Tria smirked, sticking her tongue out as the doors slid shut. Once they were gone, she turned to her brother. "So, you ready to head over to America?"

"Sure," he smiled in reply, trying his best to get his spirits back up. Huh, he'd taken that responsibility thing a little too hard. It was probably a good idea to head over there and see some new things to get his mind off of it.

"Oh, Jura and Tria!"

And someone was yelling at them. Both of them turning in perfect sync, their eyes stopped on none other than Yamamoto. Where had that guy been?

He gave them a friendly wave, which beckoned them over. Beside him was a short flight of stairs attached to a circular set of doors. "I just finished helping Leon find his way to America." A pause. "Well, more like I finished talking to Leon while he ignored me. But he did get over there. Basically I've been teaching everyone how to use the World Gate."

"Cool!" Tria grinned, running up to the machine, "Tell me how this thing works! I'm ready to head over there right now!"

"Alright, hold on," Yamamoto chuckled, walking up next to her. He pointed to the red map next to the doors. "You select where you want to go on there-" Tria smashed her finger on 'America' "-and then scan your Warden License on the red square on the opposite side."

"Jura, hand me our license," the blunette demanded, holding out a gloved hand. Jura began to pull it out, only the be stopped by Yamamoto.

He held up his hands awkwardly. "It's around two, right?"

"Yeah," Jura replied, glancing up at the clock.

"Then you should grab your stuff _before _you head over."

Tria groaned, head tilting back. Well that stunk. That meant they'd have to go get all their clothes and junk, and that would take Jura forever to pack up. Unless…

"I'll go get it!" Tria announced, bolting off before her brother could reply. She jogged down the hall, barely stopping in time to get into their room. In a mad rush, she threw their huge, worn brown suitcase on the floor and starting chucking things into it. Pajamas, normal clothes, underwear, blankets, toothbrushes, oh, and deodorant. Couldn't forget that.

After grabbing what she thought was sufficient for a trip from that room for around three days, which seemed like about how long they would be in America, she picked up the suitcase and started running back. Besides, if they stayed any longer, they could just pop back in and grab some extra stuff.

Finally she was back in the lobby. Very short of breath, but back. And it looked like Yamamoto had explained some stuff to Jura while she was gone. Even better. She didn't have to listen to another explanation.

Seeing that she was back, Jura headed up to the World Gate. Tria was close behind, eagerly bouncing from foot to foot. It was a wonder she could keep her balance, what with the huge, awkward suitcase.

"Alright, let's do this!" Tria shouted, nudging at her sibling. He pulled out their license, scanning it just as they were supposed to. Sure enough, the doors slid open.

The portal behind the door was a swirling blue with a black center, almost like a black hole. It sucked at them, sort of like a giant vacuum, a really weak giant vacuum. With a laugh, Tria grabbed Jura's wrist and jumped into it.

* * *

Everything felt weird. Like, it felt like she was floating with no sense of direction. Maybe she was upside down? Then a wave of nausea hit her, and their feet were on the ground.

The first few minutes of their arrival was spent recovering from the trip. Both of them were dizzy as heck, which Tria assumed was just a side effect everyone who first started using the World Gate experienced. But Nibbles was okay, so maybe that wasn't the case. After that, they had to figure out why it was so dark in there.

Only one light was on, and it was right in front of a set of doors similar to the elevator in Warden HQ, except there was nothing that indicated it was an elevator. No one was in the lobby, and it was really quiet. Eerily quiet.

"Where the heck is everyone?" Tria asked no one in particular. Her words echoed through the place. Man that was spooky.

Then, all of a sudden, the not-elevator doors slid open and someone walked out, yawning. She was definitely older than them, maybe around Leon's age, if not older, with dirty blonde hair. Also, she had a lot of red, white, and blue on. A blue denim jacket with red and white sleeves, a white crop top tied together in the front, a red hair tie- she was basically screaming American. The brown riding boots really didn't help with that.

The twins both jumped, Jura squeaking and Nibbles growling. That got her attention. She was also startled by them being there. Tria wasn't sure if that was a good sign or not.

"What the…"

She headed over towards them, obviously confused. It wasn't until she was a couple feet away from them that she seemed to realize who they were.

"Oh! You're Jura and Tria!" She appeared rather pleased with herself for remembering. "The Captain told us all about you two, and your cute little vivosaur!"

Nibbles' eyes perked up upon being mentioned. Man, he sure had learned how to take compliments pretty quickly.

"Anyways, I'm Becky, one of the staff members here." She had to stop for a second to yawn. Why the heck was she so tired?

Fed up with wondering, Tria decided just to ask. "Where the heck is everyone, and why is it so dark?"

Becky seemed surprised. "Didn't Stryker tell you?"

Blank expressions answered her question. Sighing, she pinched the bridge of her nose. "I swear sometimes he's worse than Sean… Look, we're 15 hours behind HQ."

"No way." Jura seemed indecisive about how he felt. For once, Tria knew how he felt. But the moment passed, and then she was just mad.

"Wait, so it's like eleven at night here?!" she shouted, hands clenching into fists. Becky nodded, earning a groan from the blunette. Yamamoto probably knew about the time change. But did he tell them? No, all he said was to get their stuff.

Jura carefully pushed Tria's hands back down to her sides, trying to calm her down. Like heck she'd let him. "Well, we're pretty bushed, so going to bed right now probably wouldn't hurt."

He sort of had a point. They'd almost died the day before, then they had the Warden Test that day. She was kinda tired. Vaguely tired. Not tired enough to go to bed. But Becky seemed like an okay person so far, so Tria figured she could at least pretend she was sleepy.

After a moment of thinking over what Jura had said, the blonde smiled weakly and nodded. "Alright, sounds like a plan. But first, let me at least introduce you to my brother, Sean, just so he knows you're here. He's the boss around here-" Sniggering interrupted "-Do NOT ask me how that happened."

So, with Becky in the lead, they trudged into Sean's office, which was apparently behind those not-elevator doors. It was pretty spacious in there, especially in comparison the Stryker's office, with a _really_ huge skull fossil on the right side of it. In the top left corner was a blue and yellow desk with a computer on it.

Sitting at the desk, doing some last minute things before heading off to bed, was Sean. And boy, he definitely looked American. Blond hair with a cowlick, a red bandanna around his neck, and the sort of outfit a rancher would wear colored in red, white, and blue, topped off with worn jeans, cowboy boots, and even a flipping lasso hooked to his belt. The funniest part was that he was in his mid 20s, so he actually looked like a cowboy.

"Hey, Sean, Stryker's outdone you for worst forgotten detail," Becky teased, smirking as he looked up from his desk. His light blue eyes went from her to the twins, and he grinned. Holy smokes, were his teeth white.

"Heck yeah!" he cheered, jumping up to his feet and walking over to Becky. It was kind of funny seeing them next to each other, because he was a few inches taller than her, but Becky wasn't all that tall to start with. In fact, Sean was actually a bit shorter than Jura. Still, he sure was a heck of a lot more energetic than Jura.

After another few seconds of enjoying his victory, Sean focused back on Jura and Tria. "Sorry, this probably blows for you guys, huh?" He rubbed the back of his neck, immediately sympathetic.

"Just a little bit," Tria replied, sarcastic yet still sounding friendly. She was in a better mood for whatever reason. Jura probably appreciated that.

"Well, we've probably got a spare room or two around here you can crash in," Sean offered, gesturing to the lobby. Jura's eyes lit up.

"You mean, we can have separate rooms?" the redhead inquired hopefully. Tria had never even thought about being in a different bedroom than Jura. That would be awesome.

He seemed confused by the statement. "I mean, yeah. Why wouldn't you?"

"No reason, none at all!" Tria interjected, shoving her brother in a vaguely desperate manner to tell him not to argue with her. She wasn't sure if Sean would make them share a room, but she sure as heck wasn't going to risk it.

But, Sean seemed to accept her reasoning, if you could call it that. With another grin, he started to walk out of the office, the twins assuming they were supposed to follow him. They stopped in the lobby briefly so Becky could head off to wherever those two lived, then it was back to finding them rooms.

The hallways were all really dark, and the constant grinding sound of Tria dragging that old suitcase, not to mention Nibbles' claws clicking against the floor, was kind of nerve racking. At least, it was for Jura. He was all pale and stuff. It was really funny.

At least, for the first twenty minutes it was. Then Tria was starting to wonder if Sean actually knew what rooms were open, because there didn't seem to be too many doors, and they were kind of just going in circles. That, and he'd been rattling off where everything was, and getting _really_ sidetracked, the entire time they'd been looking.

"-basically, my uncle's not all that killer. I mean, sure, he _does_ own a whole park, but I've got one too, technically speaking, and at least I don't sound like some gnarly hic-"

"Yo, Sean." Time to figure out if she was right.

He turned his head slightly, but kept walking. "What's up, Tria?"

"Are we gonna get a room anytime soon?"

That stopped him.

Actually turning around now, Sean was starting to look sheepish. "Well, uh, about that…"

"Yeah?"

"I, uh, forgot to ask Becks which rooms were open…"

"You mean you don't know these things?" And now Jura was getting in on this.

All of a sudden, the blond looked sort of serious. "Dude, I can hardly remember that one scientist kid's name back at HQ."

Jura blinked a couple of times, incredulous. "You mean Little?"

A dismissive wave. "Yeah, that guy." But then Sean was smiling again, seemingly over the discussion. "Basically, Becks keeps track of everything, and I just manage it or whatever."

"Well, that's fine and all, but what are we gonna do about getting a room?" Jura asked, actually starting to sound frustrated.

"I got this," Tria announced, walking up to a random door. Her sibling shot her a questioning look, to which she rolled her eyes. "It'll be like ding-dong-ditch, but with knocking."

"Sounds rad!" Sean shot her a thumbs-up, which meant her plan was endorsed. Smirking, the blunette knocked on the first door.

Someone groaned and groggily opened the door. By then, Tria and Sean were around the corner trying not to laugh, with Jura standing next to them holding the suitcase. He looked so disappointed in both of them. It was great.

The next few doors resulted in about the same outcome, except for the one person who just threw a pillow at the door. Tria could relate to that. They had just about figured out the two empty rooms. Only four left.

Running up to the closest one, sniggering almost hysterically, Tria hissed back, "Alright, I'm gonna get this one."

Sean glanced over to her briefly, still laughing slightly, then froze immediately upon realizing which door she was at. "Wait, no, not that one-"

Too late, she'd knocked. And then all of a sudden, someone was yelling at them.

"SEAN, I SWEAR IF THIS IS ANOTHER INITIATION PRANK-"

That sort of sounded like Leon, just a lot grouchier than usual. Tria bolted, shoving Sean as she ran by him. Leon was mad at him, after all, so the obvious solution was to sacrifice him.

Somehow they both managed to escape unscathed. Well, Leon didn't actually chase them. At least, Tria didn't think he did. All the adrenaline just made it feel like they had escaped some untimely death.

Jura was staring at them from a few feet away, sitting atop their suitcase, Nibbles seated next to him. He still looked pretty unimpressed with the two of them, as did his tiny vivosaur. But then again, Tria was used to it. She'd gotten that look her entire life, just maybe not from Nibbles. That stupid little eyesore was just mimicking Jura, she was sure of it.

"So, do we have rooms yet?" the bored redhead asked, resting his chin in his hands. Tria was about to answer, but Sean beat her to it.

"Actually, now that I'm thinkin' about it, I'm pretty sure the rooms next to Leon's are both empty," he replied in a completely confident tone, despite the fact that for the last half hour he had no idea where anything was. There wasn't even a hint of embarrassment. Tria was thoroughly impressed.

Her brother was also surprised, just not in the impressed way. "Why'd you only remember just now?"

Sean just shrugged. "I dunno. Usually I just remember stuff randomly. It's kind of trippy, really." He paused, trying to think of the best way to describe it. "Like, I'm talking about something, then BAM! It's in my head, y'know?"

"Not really," Jura answered, sounding only more confused than before the explanation. But then again, he did tend to overthink things.

"Guys, the rooms," Tria threw in. She was starting to get a bit impatient. Sure, she wasn't all that tired, and sure, she got them sidetracked in the first place, but they'd been trying for a while now and she really just wanted to check out for the day.

"Right, right, sorry, let's go."

So, with Sean in the lead once more, they headed back to where Leon's room had been. Luckily the doors weren't locked, since apparently Becky _also_ kept all the room keys somewhere. Jura and Nibbles went straight in, taking the suitcase with them since Tria wouldn't need it until the next day, and neither of them felt like divvying up the clothes and such yet.

"You guys'll check in with me tomorrow, right?" Sean asked as Tria started into her room. She peeked back out the door, smirking.

"Course, Sean. You're too cool not to," the pink clad teen shot back, aiming a finger gun at him from between the door and its frame. He laughed in a hushed sort of way; they were by Leon's room, after all.

"Groovy! See ya' later, then."

Tria watched the surprisingly childish Warden head off, an equally childish grin on her face. Man, Fossil Park America was a heck of a lot more fun than HQ.

* * *

**Heyyyyyy, remember when I said that I was gonna update _A Change of Pace_ next, but that I was really motivated to write this chapter. Yeah, I was REALLY motivated to write this chapter, because Sean. I know it's a bit shorter than what I've done the last few chapters, but I wanted to update this one last time before school started up again, because who knows what'll happen with the update rate after that. Also I wrote like 70% of this chapter in one night, so if the flow gets kinda weird near the end, sorry, I took a couple day break after that.  
**

**Anyways, sorry if you posted a review asking me to change something and I didn't. As most of you probably know, the review system is glitching right now or something. Heck, I feel weird updating this without reading those reviews, but I've got no power over this situation. ;-;**


	9. Siblings and Chattering

They'd barely been Wardens for a day, and Jura was already starting to feel more independent. First they had separate beds, now separate rooms; who knew what was next? Though that joint license thing had sort of ruined the fun.

After the whole room ordeal, Jura and Nibbles had just gone straight to bed. Somehow the teen had managed to sleep until about 6:30, which was pretty impressive considering it was technically 3 in the afternoon, according to his sleeping schedule, when he'd gone to bed. He wasn't sure if his new vivosaur had slept at all, but the little bugger was more than happy to bounce along after him when he got up.

Figuring he could use some time away from Tria, because goodness knows how overwhelming she could be, Jura decided he'd just go wander around the base. Maybe they would have breakfast going. The duo headed down the hallway, which was still fairly dark, and into the lobby. From there, they wandered in and out of other hallways until, finally, he'd found what looked like the cafeteria.

It was huge, and looked just like the one in the Asian branch, with additional colors of red, white, and blue. And also a couple pop machines and coffee makers. Very important additions.

The room should have been really quiet, seeing it was early, but it really wasn't. Sitting at the table furthest from the door were Sean and Becky, who were surprisingly talkative. And also _they were there_. Seriously, they were probably gone from the base for around 7 hours, closer to 6 for Sean. How were they even awake, let alone energetic?

And Sean was waving him over. Maybe without Tria, he could have a decent conversation with those two. Jura had barely taken a step before Nibbles darted ahead of him up to the blonde siblings. Well, more specifically, Becky. He must have remembered being called cute the day before.

By the time Jura had caught up to his vivosaur, Becky was holding him while a loud purr-growl reverberated from his throat. And, less than a day ago, he had almost bitten Penny's head off for trying to pet him. Either Nibbles was learning social skills fast, or he really did hate Penny. Jura prefered to think it was the former.

"So, how'd you sleep, little dude?" Sean asked as he put his feet up on a chair by a neighboring table. As tempting as it was to point out that he was technically taller, and therefore should not be referred to as 'little', Jura decided to go for a more respectful approach. Though, in hindsight, his joke probably would have made things go smoother.

A simple shrug. "Alright, I guess. But what about you guys? You were barely gone for all that long."

Sean just dismissively waved his hand, completely unfazed by the question. "Stryker says one of us should always be here or whatever, but there's no way Becks and I could run this place alone. Things would get pretty unrighteous pretty fast."

"Tell me about it," Becky snorted, rolling her eyes. She stopped petting Nibbles long enough to get a sip of her coffee. Her brother broke out laughing.

"Please, you couldn't deal with being in charge _one_ day. The only time we tried that out, you were, like, having a panic attack or something by the end of the day."

"Yeah? Well at least I didn't forget to tell _everyone_ that a bunch of rogues had gotten loose in the Park until two hours afterwards."

Jura started to feel uncomfortable as the two started glaring at each other. It was always weird when people you didn't really know started arguing. Then, all of a sudden, they were both laughing. Huh. That wasn't really how his and Tria's disagreements usually ended.

"But yeah, we totally suck and running this place," Sean continued, grinning, almost as though his explanation had not been interrupted. "So we both stay late, catch a few Zs, then head in at the crack a' dawn."

"Don't you get tired?" Jura inquired, still confused. Literally no one could run on like 5 hours of sleep all week every week.

Another dismissive wave. "Dude, I take naps in my office all the time. That's what the chair's for."

Well, that seemed logical enough.

"Besides," Becky added in, "Leon's probably gonna start running night shift soon. If he'll, you know, start behaving like a proper Warden." Her chipper tone took a drop down to cross grumbling near the end.

Again, her brother smirked. "Yeah, he's almost as bad as you, Becks." She leaned over and punched his arm, only causing him to break out in snickers. "What? He's a huge, stubborn know-it-all, just like you."

"At least _I'm _pleasant to work with."

"Suuuuure."

There was a quick break out of playful whacking in that sibling sort of way, during which Nibbles decided he was being moved around too much and jumped back down next to Jura. He gave his small partner a quick rub on the head, figuring he might as well sit down and wait for them to finish messing with each other. It must have been nice to be super close with your family. He and Tria would probably have been legitimately mad at each other at that point. And wrestling with Tria would just be painful. Really painful.

Their small 'fight' ended with Sean having an arm around Becky's neck, his knuckles digging into her head. She was laughing to the point of not really having any strength in her arms, but eventually just shoved him off, yelling, "Get out of here, you jerk!" But she'd barely said that without giggling through the whole thing.

They were definitely… interesting, to say the least.

It took a few minutes, since Sean had to catch his breath, but it seemed he'd remembered something out of the blue. But apparently that was normal. Jura wasn't sure how that could possibly be normal, since it sounded like something that only happened to old people, but it was probably better not to question it.

"Hey, just thought of this now, but you and your sis are probs wondering about assignments, huh?" Wow, it was actually useful information at a useful time.

"Actually, yeah," Jura replied uncertainly, hoping to bite back his sarcastic side slowly bubbling up. He only tried to use that with people his age, but it was hard not to with Sean. For some reason, the blond seemed younger than him, and Jura had not idea why. Well, maybe a little bit of an idea. He had played a form of ding-dong-ditch with Tria last night.

Grinning, Sean shot him a thumbs-up. Why did that make his teeth look whiter? "Coolio! So, Becks, anything these guys can help with?"

His younger sister finished her next swallow of coffee while she thought on it. "Lucky's coming over from Europe in about a week," she replied, casting a slightly embarrassed looked to Jura. "Leon's supposed to handle it, but he's being such a baby about having someone help him."

"Sounds about right," the redhead smiled, thinking back to his reaction to doing the Warden Test. He probably thought he looked cool and edgy, but really he just came off as a whiny baby.

"As for Lucky, I'm sure you'll like him," Becky continued, probably reassuring him that helping out wouldn't be so bad. "He seems kind of stuck up, but… He's nice. Really nice."

Sean elbowed Jura, leaning over and whispering, "Becks just likes him 'cause she's a huge momma hen. Even over me. She's not allowed to help because she'd, like, obsess over him like his mom does already."

"I would not!" his sister protested, crossing her arms and glowering weakly at him. Man, Sean really stunk at whispering. Either that or he'd said it sort of loud on purpose.

Whatever the reason, he still looked smug. He put his boots up on the table this time, leaning way back in his chair. Jura was certain the thing would flip.

"Yeah, you're right. You'd be waaaay worse."

"That's not what I meant!"

And that's about how the rest of their conversation went. Random topics with random debates between Sean and Becky, and it was a fairly consistent pattern. And yet, despite their little squabbles, everything seemed quite friendly between them.

Eventually it got late enough into the morning hours for them to have to leave to do whatever stuff it took to run the Park. Well, Becky was probably going to get on that. Jura had a feeling Sean was just going to take a nap.

Once they'd gone, Jura figured he might as well get something to eat, because it had been a little over 12 hours since he'd had anything. Besides, that _was_ why he'd been looking for the cafeteria in the first place, as fun as it was talking with Sean and Becky.

He ended up just eating some cereal, because why not, and managed to find some bacon and sausage for Nibbles. At first, Jura had tried to ask the small vivosaur how he liked his breakfast. It occurred to him suddenly that Nibbles wasn't responding telepathically like a normal vivo would. In fact, he didn't even look up at Jura when the teen thought the question. Maybe that was why Stryker and Little were worried about him.

But, Nibbles looked pretty happy with his food, so that was good enough for him. Maybe at some point they'd be able to talk. It seemed they'd be limited to a sort of dog-owner relationship for the time being. Well, Nibbles was a little more expressive than a dog. Maybe more like a parrot-owner relationship.

With still no sign of Tria showing up, it seemed like he'd have to go find her. She either went to sleep, which was really unlikely, or she'd wandered off somewhere. After thinking on it, if she had gotten up, she would have made a beeline for Sean, no doubt.

So, with a little searching plan in mind, Jura set out with his chirring vivosaur in tow to find his annoying sister.

Well, she definitely wasn't in her room. Why the heck did he even consider that a place to look? Tria would never even attempt sleeping if she wasn't tired.

Next was, obviously, Sean's office, which was not somewhere he really wanted to go. For one, they may not have an elevator going up to it, but holy smokes did they have one heck of a flight of stairs. Jura, not being in very good shape, loathed that staircase. His sister, on the other hand, had barely noticed it last her, it was probably like walking straight into the office. Anyways, Sean had mentioned it during their little chat. Something about discouraging people who just came in for the sake of complaining.

Heaving himself up the stairs, Nibbles easily bouncing up beside him, Jura began his trek up. Finally reaching the top after a solid five minutes, the redhead tried his best to not appear short of breath as the doors slid open and he stepped in.

Sure enough, there was his darn sister, having a good old chat with Sean.

They were laughing, probably having a blast. Oh well. He and Tria had a joint license, so they _both_ had to be present if either of them wanted to do something with their Bone Buggy.

"Hey, Tria," Jura stated simply, walking up to where she was leaning on Sean's desk. She glanced up at him, if only to acknowledge his presence.

"What's up, bro?" she asked, though there wasn't a ton of care to her voice. The last thing she wanted to do was leave, and he knew that. Not that he cared enough to go without her.

Crossing his arms while trying his best to sound stern, Jura gave off a short huff. "Well, I think we should go do some Missionator stuff, and probably some Seven Scrambles as well."

"Nah." She didn't even know what those were. "How about we head out to Goldrush Canyon? Sean says there're some pretty sweet digs out there."

Ah yes. Sean had forgotten to tell him about an _entire dig site_. The information had been relayed to him eventually, but still. What if Tria hadn't come up to see him?

"Oh, hey!" Speak of the devil. "Almost spaced on somethin' again!" The blond paused to rummage through a drawer, then another, and finally pulled out a little chip, which he handed to Jura. "Stryke-man wanted me to give you that. Said it would save you guys money."

"What is this, exactly?" Jura inquired as he scrutinized the thing. It looked sort of like a microchip, but a lot more heavy-duty. Suddenly he felt a bit less spiteful towards Sean, though admittedly most of said spite was just caused by how much Tria liked him.

The branch leader paused a second, fingers drumming on his desk as he thought about it. "It's a sonar upgrade doohickey. Helps you find mondo coolio fossils to make your vivos mega strong." The hat clad teen was about to thank him, when the man's eyes lit up all of a sudden. "Oh! And there're new support shots at the garage for you!"

He seemed quite proud of himself for remembering all of that in one bout. Maybe even a little cocky. His feet went up on the desk and he leaned back, arms behind his head. "So yeah, you two have a gnarly time, and definitely let me know if you get anything really rad!"

Tria stood up straight and looked right up at Jura, smirking. Then, just as he was expecting, she gave him a quick shove and yelled, "First one to the Buggy gets to dig first!"

Of course, Jura knew that there was no way he could beat Tria there. She'd kick his butt easily, after all, she loved to run. It would be completely illogical to even think about beating her-

"You're on, sis!"

* * *

And Tria beat him to the Bone Buggy. Yeah, he really had no idea why he took up her challenge. Handing off the sonar upgrade to the lady that worked at the garage, Jura trudged over to the passenger side and climbed up. It took a few seconds for it to register in his head that something was different.

"Hold on, why is our car bigger?" He paused for a second, checking for any more changes. " Also, why is it red?"

Tria grinned and leaned back, a mixture of pride and apprehension on her face. "I spent all our money on a new Bone Buggy. And burgundy paint. But that was just to make it cooler."

"_All_ of our money?" Jura almost shouted, shooting his sister a dirty look. She rolled her eyes, exhaling loudly.

"Look, we'll just go dig up some stuff and make more cash. No problemo!"

Jura was about to say something else, but decided against it last minute. For once, she had a good point, and as much as he wanted to chew her out for spending _their_ money without consulting him, he would rather see what cool vivosaurs they had in America. Being responsible could go on the backburner for a little while.

The mechanic lady looked like she was done putting in their new sonar, and literally the second she had stepped away Tria was slamming on the gas. She was messing with him now, he was sure of it. His fear still kicked in, and his arms and legs were braced against the windows and upholstery in a split second, Nibbles noting his reaction and latching onto his leg.

They zoomed through a tunnel which opened up to an expanse of sand and mountains. A few cacti and desert grass were scattered around in the hot sand, and a carving of a T-Rex and a Triceratops protruded from one of the larger rock formations. Not that Tria cared to slow down for Jura to look at it, cool as it was. She was in her digging zone, and once she was in it was hard to get her out.

Well, it was hard for _him_ to get her out. She was more than happy to stop their Buggy and chat with Sean about Goldrush Canyon. Not that he was bad about them talking, heck no, it was just annoying that Tria never listened to him. She broke her arm once because of that. 'Don't climb up in that old, dead tree,' he said, 'the branches are probably brittle.' And guess what? They were. That was last summer; she really needed to get better about listening.

Currently they were discussing ramming into rocks with their Bone Buggy, which really didn't seem like it would be good for the vehicle. All Jura could think about were the repair bills. Sure, they hadn't had to pay when the Gorgo wrecked their car, but in all honesty that was probably because it wasn't their fault.

It would be fantastic if Nibbles could start talking right at that point. Maybe he could get Jack out for company. A shudder accompanied the thought. _No, Jack is definitely worse than boredom._

Finally, Tria hung up. "Took you long enough," Jura grumbled, Nibbles backing up his grouchiness with agitated growls. The blunette stuck her tongue out again and shifted back into drive.

"Man, you're salty today," Tria stated, flooring the pedal and causing them to shoot off again, effectively silencing the car. Well, talking-wise it was silenced. Jura and Nibbles were both whining.

Eventually they came to a halt next to a single, tall spire of rock. Tria hit the sonar, grinning as a small 'ping' popped up on the map. The drill and hammer popped out, and she set to work.

Lucky for her, it seemed that both of them were destined to get an insanely easy fossil to clean. After a few seconds of cleaning, Tria was left with a 100 point skull for a Titano AR, whatever that was. Energy encapsulated the fossil, and then it was growing and growing and…

Four thick, orange, armored legs suspended an even thicker orange, armored sauropod. Its grey plates ran from its head, down its long neck, and all the way to the tip of its stubby tail. It was probably about as long as Racer, just twice as tall, and definitely heavier.

Jura stared at the massive vivosaur, jaw hanging open. Nibbles snarled at it, like he did with most things that made him uncomfortable. Gosh that thing was huge. Its large blue eyes gazed through the window, almost as if to take in every little detail about the twins and their red companion. While he was feeling intimidated by the beast, Tria was waving at it like the cheerful dope she was.

"Hey there, big guy!" she shouted to it. Immediately, its eyes shifted to her specifically, scrutinizing every detail of her pink and black clad body. After a few moments of silent staring, the creature snorted, fogging up their windshield briefly.

Grinning suddenly, Tria looked over to her brother. "I'm gonna call him Morton," she stated matter-of-factly. Jura stared at her questioningly, then at 'Morton', then back at her. She was serious. Why did that not surprise him?

"Does he think that's a good name?" Jura decided to ask after a moment. It was weird not being able to hear her new vivosaur. Then again, it had been that way with Maisy, too. Racer had just mixed things up a bit.

Tria nodded eagerly. "Heck yeah he does!" That seemed to settle it. Morton flashed into a white Dino Gear, which VR-00M retrieved, and his hot-blooded sister returned to driving them around. Jura was about to start whining, Nibbles clutched to his chest, but she barely drove them 20 feet before stopping next to another rock.

"I thought I saw something over here when I set the sonar off," she explained briefly, activating the sonar once more. Sure enough, there was a fossil beside them. Tria was a lot more observant than he thought.

That fossil resulted in 92 point arms for Morton, putting him up a rank. Tria looked pretty pleased with herself. Yeah, she would be digging for a while. He should have brought something to do.

A few moment passed, Tria seemingly basking in her glory. Then, she turned to face Jura. "Hey, bro, you wanna dig for a little bit?"

His eyes lit up, wide with surprise. No flipping way. "I-I mean, heck yeah I do!" She smirked in reply, unbuckling and opening the door, jumping out of the seat. Jura unbuckled and crawled over, happily buckling in. Someone had replaced his sister, he was sure. There was no way she could be so nice.

Tria climbed back in on the other side, picking up Nibbles and setting him down on the middle console thing. She didn't say anything else. Sharing an apprehensive look with his vivosaur, Jura gently pushed down on the gas and very slowly turned them around.

Eventually they made it out of the little secluded area Tria had drove them to. They were underneath the elevated road running through most of the dig site, which was supported in a few parts by columns of rock similar to the one Morton's head had been in. Jura pressed down on the sonar, and a blue blip appeared on one of the spires. He meticulously drove them up to the point, activating it once more to trigger his digging tools.

Then everything turned to pure chaos. It was a skull, but a _huge_ crest protruded from the back. There was no time for drilling. He just hammered at it like a madman. Bone crackled and purple spots began to emerge, and then the clock ended.

VR-00M popped out, as per usual, and gave the analysis. "Specimen: Thalasso, Type: Skull fossil, Score: 85!" That wasn't so bad, considering their weak tools and, obviously, the huge size of that crest. The multi-colored beam shot out and encapsulated the bone, streamlining into a brittle shape with a monstrous crest, as expected.

The vivosaur finished reviving on the hood of their Buggy. Standing at about Jura's height, if its crest was included, the small pterosaur boasted blue fur with white patches splattered over its wings and crest, its underside being purely white. Its toothless beak curved into a nervous smile.

Jura and the pterosaur stared at each other for a moment, green eyes meeting brown. Neither of them spoke, just took in the other. It was sort of like what had happened with Morton, except in this case the lack of speech was based on uncertainty of who would speak first.

Swallowing, Jura decided it would be him. "_Hey there!"_ he began softly, not sure if the vivosaur was shy. If not, it probably wouldn't hurt to start off a conversation kindly.

The vivosaur sighed with relief, though the sigh turned into one long exhalation of words. "_ThankgooodnessyoustartedtalkingfirstIwasn'tsureIcouldhandledoingit!" _

Why me. That was all Jura could muster for his reaction. First Jack's screaming, now her combined words. Maybe hers would be fixable.

Blinking a few times as he tried to comprehend the sentence, Jura continued. "_Yeah… So, uh, I can just name you, right?"_

The Thalasso took a deep breath, her thin chest quivering from the size of it. "_Of course! Sorry my words got a little close together sometimes when I get excited they alljustsortofblendand-!"_

"_I get it," _Jura stopped her, lifting his hands up. She grew silent, awkwardly dancing between her feet. "_Don't worry about it, uh…" _Gotta get a name, that's right. Well, she was chatty, that was for sure. Like a little songbird. Hey. "_Shrike. I'll call you Shrike."_

She trilled, her body shaking from head to tail excitedly. "_I like it! It's got a good ring to it! A good, goodgoodgood ring!"_ Beaming, Shrike climbed up the side of the Bone Buggy, her beak pecking at the window. A bit confused, Jura rolled it down for her, only for the pterosaur to climb in, her body shrinking down so she could fit inside. She took a seat atop her fighter's head, nibbling at his spiked up hair.

"_Why are you coming in here?" _Jura asked, beginning to feel minor frustration. He tried to pick her up, but her nails dug into his head, and his hands were met with nips and angry clicks.

"_Because! You're my coolio buddy now and that's that!"_ the Thalasso squealed, hunkering down further on his hat, making the occasional nibble on its fabric. Nibbles made an attempt at pulling her off, a low growl in his throat, but was met by a striking nip to the nose. He fell backwards, making Shrike and Tria break out in laughter.

It seemed she was there to stay. Not that he really had a problem with it, when he thought about it. All she was doing was hanging out on his head. No big deal. That wouldn't interrupt digging up fossils.

Which reminded him. Jura turned to his sister, smiling and waiting for her laughter to ease up. "Hey, sis, thanks for letting me dig. I mean, I'm not done yet, but still." She rolled her eyes, grinning.

"Eh, Morton was harassing me to let you take a turn."

Yeah, that made a lot more sense. Even if he hardly knew the vivosaur, most anyone could be fairer than Tria. Really, it wasn't that hard to beat her.

And yet, he really didn't want to tell her that. The best he could do was say "Oh." Not that she really cared.

But, there were still plenty of fossil to dig up. Why dwell on stupid things like that when he could have fun with that?

* * *

**Hey, I, uh, updated at a non-outrageous time. For those of you who don't know, I _really_ like Sean and Lucky, so this group of chapters may come faster than usual. I'm sticking with 'may' come faster, because you can never tell with me. I might hit a lazy streak half-way through one of these and take another month.**

**Oh, and thanks for the reviews, guys! They mean a lot to me! Help with motivation and stuff. **

**Also, as a disclaimer, any grammatical errors with Shrike's dialogue were intentional. **


	10. Psychics and Wolves

So listening to Morton had been boring, apart from Shrike and Nibbles fighting the whole time Jura was driving. Tria let him find the rest of his Thalasso's parts, which included a body and arms, before taking back the wheel. She'd found some legs for Morton after that.

Around the mid-afternoon, they headed back to Asia to get see if they could find more fossils for Jack, Maisy, and Racer. Which they did. Arms for Jack and Maisy, and a head and body for Racer. Then it was back to America. After all, if they didn't adjust to the time change there, they'd be exhausted for when Lucky showed up for their assignment, whoever that was.

After that, every day was just Seven Scrambles and free time. It was pretty relaxing, actually. Lots of fighting with video games and sleeping on the side. And Jura said she wouldn't have time to use her laptop. Plus, with all the money they were getting from the tournaments and jewels, Tria was well on her way to getting an actual gaming system. The laptop was intended for school, so it really didn't count, even if it did have a whole bunch of games on it.

Their schedule changed just a bit the day before the assignment. Jura had been whining for a while about doing Missionator jobs, so Tria figured that she could sacrifice a day of Seven Scrambles to shut him up. That and they brought Nate and Roland with them, which was fun. Well, mostly Nate was fun. Roland was like dragging around a more annoying version of Jura.

Finally assignment day was there. Which was exciting, but also kind of stunk since they had to get up at like six. Stupid time zones. Europe was like 8 hours ahead of America, and apparently Lucky wanted to get there as early as possible, which would be seven-ish, so they had to get up at six to get ready in time.

Tria felt like a zombie for the first twenty minutes or so, but her grogginess wore off soon after that. She just had to keep telling herself that her first assignment was gonna be awesome. They would have a ton of fun, maybe get in a couple fossil battles, then head out to the next place.

Shooting up the stairs, Jura and Nibbles lagging behind her, Tria burst into Sean's office. She was hoping her enthusiasm would be appreciated, but it only seemed to wake up Sean and Becky. They hadn't exactly dozed off, but they looked pretty close to it. At least Stryker let them sleep in on the weekends.

Jura and his eyesore of a vivosaur had caught up by the time they'd both woken up enough to tell them exactly what was going on. Sean sort of waved at them weakly. "Hey, guys. You any more awake then we are?"

"Heck yeah!" Tria cheered, hands going to her hips. "What's the plan for today? I'm pumped!"

Sean leaned back in his chair, taking a moment to yawn. "Well, you're babysitting Lucky, and new guy's gonna, like, help out with that."

About then the doors slid open and none other than Leon stepped into the room. Sean flopped his arm in an attempted wave. Leon just sort of rolled his eyes in response.

"So, what's going on today, Chief?" the purple haired teen grinned for a moment. It soon vanished when he noticed Tria waving at him. Gall, that guy didn't have a friendly bone in his body.

"These two are gonna help you out since the Captain sent 'em over here. Pretty rad, huh?" Sean stated simply, throwing in one of his award-winning smiles to convince Leon he was going to enjoy the experience. It really didn't help at all.

In fact, Leon just crossed his arms. "Look, I've said it a million times, I don't need help with babysitting some kid."

"Aw, come on, Leon, don't be such a stick in the mud," Tria smirked, nudging him slightly with her elbow. He just glared down at her, which she reciprocated out of spite. What a butthead. It didn't help that her good-for-nothing brother was too intimidated by him to back her up.

At least Becky was going to. She huffed, walking up to Leon and putting her hands on her hips. "Look, instead of being a huge pain in the butt, why don't you just _try_ to be a pleasant person to work with for once in your life?" They just sort of glowered at each other for a minute, Leon breaking eye contact first to glance off to the side.

"Yeah, whatever. Don't count on it," he muttered crossly, refusing to look at Becky again. Instead, he redirected his glare to the twins beside him. "And don't count on me waiting on you two. You slow me down and I'm ditching you guys first chance I get."

"Gee, you're so thoughtful," Tria quipped back, feeling a boat-load of resentment damming up. Punching him was seeming like more and more of a good idea with every passing second. That might not look so good in front of their 'bosses', though. Maybe later.

Leon rolled his eyes, as expected, and started to walk out. "Whatever, rookie." Then, with the whir of the doors, he was gone. He was barely there for five minutes, and he'd managed to tick two people off. That was impressive.

"That dude is seriously harshing my mellow," Sean grumbled, his boots going back up on his desk. Holy smokes, make that three people. And that was extra impressive, because Sean was hard to tick off. "I try to be nice to him, but he's being totally unrighteous."

Becky jumped in on his complaining. "I don't care how 'skilled' he thinks he is, he's been a real pain in the butt about working with people, and that's basically what being a Warden is." She probably would have started ranting about it, judging by how frustrated she sounded, but her brother cut her off.

"Easy, Becks," Sean smirked, leaving her to fume to herself. He then focused back on Jura and Tria, making the taller of them flinch. He was such a baby. "Anyways, I know this it totes grody, but could you maybe talk Leon into working with you? Because I think Becks would tear his throat out if she tried, and Lucky needs more than one escort."

Tria beamed. Heck yeah, special mission type thing from Sean. "Sure! I'm pretty persuasive!" she boasted, earning a very shocked expression from Jura. He was kinda scared of Leon. She'd have to break him of that.

A surprisingly energetic thumbs-up. "Awesome! Good luck!"

* * *

Fossil Park America's stadium always had a cool layout. A large open lobby filled with shiny tan tile with red carpet over it lead up to some stairs. Above those was a platform with the receptionist, as well as a room off to the side which lead to the actual stadium. A few different places had monitors and speakers hanging from them which displayed any battles happening inside.

Standing right at the top of the stairs was Leon, looking as cocky as ever. Tria still wanted to punch him. Oh boy did she want to punch him. In fact, she was getting ready to do it when she got up the stairs. Unfortunately, he actually said something, and it just seemed weird to have someone say something to her and then reply with a punch. At least, in that instance it did.

His eyes stared down at her condescendingly. "Thought I told you to get lost, rookie."

There was a bit of a threat laced into his words, but Tria ignored it. She was ready with her snappy comeback, but Nibbles and Jura had finally caught up, and clearly her brother's stupid vivosaur attracted his attention. "Hold on a tick, what's with the vivosaur."

Jura flinched upon realizing he had to respond. Nibbles didn't appreciate that his fighter felt intimidated, and immediately growled at Leon. The purple haired teen smirked tauntingly at the vivosaur.

"Well, here's a surly fella." Nibbles snarled again, teeth bared. That vivosaur would fight just about anything, and Leon was having fun with that. "You wanna go? 'Cause I'll throw down right here!"

Suddenly, it seemed like Leon was thinking about giving Nibbles a little 'nudge' with his foot. Jura immediately lunged forward and scooped up his aggressive reptile, much to Tria's chagrin. That would have been a funny fight to watch.

"Oh, THERE you are!" someone young with a vaguely English accent shouted, their footsteps following soon after. As fun as Leon's smack talking of a vivosaur was, this sounded sort of important.

The three of them, four if they counted Nibbles, turned to see a really short boy_,_ probably around Little's age, running up to them, a blue vivosaur that looked a lot like Maisy in tow. The kid had red hair, but with enough brown to it that it was nowhere near the intensity of Jura's hair. His clothes, a gold-edged red t-shirt and grey shorts with gold patterns, hung quite loosely over his scrawny build. Black bracelet-things were around each of his wrists, and a silver, sun-like charm with a blue stone at its center hung around his neck. Probably the most notable thing about him was the red birthmark on his forehead, which consisted of a large, upside-down 'v' with two normal, smaller ones on either side of it.

His vivosaur, who _really really_ looked like a blue Maisy, had a large white crest that curled up into spikes. White armor went down its back, and its knees had a bit, too. Fierce brown eyes glared up at them, almost as if saying 'if this kid gets hurt, I'll gut each of you'.

Gold eyes sparkling with excitement, the kid bounced up to their small group. "You guys must be my escort! What took you so long? I've got things to do, and only a few hours to do 'em! My mum'll throw a fit if I'm not back in time for supper!" His gaze moved from Tria, to Jura, then rested on Leon for a minute. A brief flash of uneasiness came over his face as he glanced to his vivosaur. After that he was back to his big, ecstatic grin.

Leon immediately tried to die down his buzz. With another one of his stuck-up looks, he grumbled out, "Who's this mope?"

The kid's attitude took a 180 and immediately switched from bubbly to sassy. Hands on his hips, staring defiantly up at Leon, who was arguable more than twice his size, he snapped back, "I'm no mope! I'm Lucky!" He leaned back, taking on a cockier approach. "I'm the VIP you're SUPPOSED to be escorting!" A sly grin added insult to injury. "Don't tell me you forgot already."

Tria stood there, mouth hanging open just a bit. She looked over to Leon, who appeared to have just taken a major blow to his pride. A nine year old had just sassed the pants off of him. Glancing back at Lucky, who still seemed quite smug, she decided that she liked him. She liked him a lot.

"Hey, Jura?" Leon started, suppressed frustration leaking out through his words. The redhead immediately gazed up at him like a deer in headlights. Oh boy. "Lemme ask you something, one professional to another…"

Nibbles was starting to growl now. He was very protective of Jura, and it was becoming more obvious. And annoying. Seriously, Jura needed to teach him some manners.

But it seemed Leon didn't really care about the snarls coming at him. He continued anyways. "Think anyone would mind if I smacked this mope upside the head?"

A sudden growl from Lucky's vivosaur can in reply. The boy reached over and patted it on the back. "Don't kill my escorts, Morgan. I'll never get to dig if you do!"

She shot one last death glare at Leon before snorting and lowering her gaze. The teen chuckled at her defiance. Apparently he only found it amusing in vivosaurs. "I'm just kiddin', kid."

"Sure you were," Tria added in with a smirk. He ignored her remark, not that she cared.

"All right, Lucky. I'll be your escort," Leon said with a hint of resentment, dragging the small child with him as he started to walk off. "C'mon, let's beat feet for the dig site." Almost instantly Lucky was digging his heels into the ground, looking nervous again.

He ducked under Leon's arm. "Um…" A tiny hand pointed at the twins. "What about your friends? And their vivosaur?" Leon gave him another tug, earning a growl from Morgan.

"Them?" A snort. "Just baggage. I'm all the escort you need." He stood up a bit straighter for emphasis, though he slouched so badly that it didn't really make him any more intimidating, or whatever he was going for.

Lucky gave him another look over. "Well… I guess you seem strong enough to handle it." Another anxious expression that quickly changed to feigned confidence. "But if anything terrible happens to me, there's going to be heck to pay!"

And yet, despite his threat, Tria found herself fighting back snickers. She'd forgotten that little kids didn't say hell, even if it wasn't swearing. That was surprisingly hilarious.

Still, Lucky and Leon were heading out together, which she knew probably wasn't a good thing. Also Becky was walking towards them. And she looked mad. Like, really _really_ mad.

"That no good son of a-" The blonde interrupted herself with a deep, calming breath. Still, she was obviously… displeased with the situation. "I can't believe he's pulling this stupid lone wolf act with Lucky. Who does he think he's impressing?"

Jura decided he was ready to talk with Leon gone. "Well, maybe he needs to get knocked down a few pegs. Y'know, to see what happens when he needs help...?" He looked almost desperate for his suggestion to be approved of.

"Well, that's a start," Becky grumbled, still blatantly frustrated. "I just don't want that to happen with Lucky around. The poor little guy shouldn't have to pay for Leon being buttheaded."

"I'd be happy to mess with him later, if need be," Tria offered, smacking a fist into the palm of her hand. Every fiber of her being was silently begging Becky for permission to punch Leon. Just a hint of approval was all she needed.

"No, no, don't do that," Becky dismissed reluctantly. She put a hand to her forehead and sighed. "I'm letting myself get worked up by him." Gosh darn it. That definitely meant no punching. The opportunity had passed.

Much more level-headed, she continued, a bit of embarrassment to her tone. "Look, I know this is a bit awkward, but would you mind going after him? He can screw up some other time."

"Yeah, yeah, we'll take care of it," Tria muttered, biting back her disappointment. Maybe once they were done with this whole Lucky ordeal she'd punch him. Yeah. That would be fun.

Jura nodded in agreement, allowing Nibbles to jump down next to him. "Yeah, but where were they supposed to dig at?"

"Oh! They're just going out the Goldrush Canyon." Becky gestured over her shoulder for emphasis. "Since it's, y'know, Sean's favorite dig site and all."

"Gotcha!"

* * *

"Hey, Tria, shouldn't we call Nate or something? I mean, what if something bad's happened to them?"

"You're such a worry-wart, bro, it's been like ten minutes. How could something've happened in ten minutes?"

"I guess…"

Tria rolled her eyes as she steered them out to the dig site. Jura was way too paranoid about everything. He needed to focus on getting the job done, not all the stupid things that could go wrong doing it.

They'd made it a couple minutes down the road when someone called. Well, someone being Sean. He greeted them boisterously, as per usual.

"Hey, guys!" A brisk wave was sent their way. "Becks told me what happened. That's rough." His expression turned apologetic. "Sorry the new guy's being such a buzzkill."

"Well, he's just a buzzkill in general, so it's not really your fault," Tria shrugged. Sean grinned, a bit more eager to continue.

"Thanks, but I'm actually calling because I totally spaced on something!" Tria wasn't really shocked. He forgot a lot of things. But he didn't dwell on it like Jura would, so it was fine.

"Oh really?"

He rubbed at the back of his neck, embarrassed. "Yeah, it's about Lucky. Totally forgot to mention that he's, like, a pretty big deal around the American branch." Well, that was kind of obvious. "Mostly 'cause he's got, like, psychic powers."

Oh. Yeah, that would be something bad to leave out. Tria felt herself go speechless for the first time in a while, but that was mainly because she didn't know how to respond. Sean took the opportunity to keep talking.

"Yeah, I know, it's totally nuts."

"I think that's an understatement," she managed to force out sarcastically. When all else failed, resort to sarcasm.

The branch leader broke out in snickers at her quip. He cleared his throat after a few seconds to help himself refocus. "Little dude uses ESP or something to find rare fossils that don't show up on sonar." An awkward laugh. "That's why we're supposed to watch him if his mom's not around when he goes out digging. She thinks someone's gonna kidnap him and make him find stuff or whatever. Seems a little far fetched, if you ask me, but whatever. Maybe that's what having kids does to ya..."

Sean paused a second, finishing up his off-track thoughts. It was probably better he didn't say them. They'd be there all day. He finished with a thumbs-up, exclaiming, "Anyway, that's it. Catch ya later!" before hanging up.

"I wonder if that's why Lucky seemed so nervous…" Jura pondered aloud. Tria stared over at him, a bit confused. He picked up on her look immediately. "Well, if he's psychic, then maybe he knew something bad was gonna happen."

"Or he just realized he was a nine-year-old sassing someone twice his age," his sister pointed out, looking ahead. He needed to calm down. She decided she was sick of hearing his paranoid comments, and quickly slammed on the gas. Jura immediately yipped and grabbed Nibbles, clutching his vivosaur to his chest.

They continued down the road for a couple of minutes before Bone Buggies came into sight. Judging by how extremely purple one of them was, it was safe to assume it was Leon's. And that one was also smoking and not doing much. That couldn't be good.

Three smaller buggies, each with axes mounted on the hoods which seemed incredibly useless, surrounded a bright red one. In front of the red vehicle was Lucky's blue vivosaur, pinned, bruised, and bloodied by a grey, quadrupedal vivosaur with purple spikes lining its sides. Another just like it stood off to the side. They were trying to, by the looks of it, get Morgan back into her gear, but she continued to snarl and writhe despite her bad condition. That took dedication.

Tria had to sit there for a moment, jaw hanging open. How the heck had they gotten into trouble that fast? She could already feel Jura's glare baring into the side of her head.

"I flipping told you they'd be in trouble!" he shouted, arms gesturing towards the crime scene in front of them. Nibbles let out a supportive growl. "Now we have to fight them by ourselves!"

She pinched the bridge of her nose. He'd lecture her about listening to him once they were out of this mess, she could tell. But that was less important, sort of. Save Lucky first, worry about getting chewed out later.

After barely a few seconds of thought, she just drove down into the fray. Jura was already squealing for her to back up until he figured out a plan. Oh well, too late.

A voice came in over their radio all of a sudden. "You shoulda driven past us, Warden. Now we're gonna make you pay!" Jura paled considerably at the comment. Neither of them answered him, though.

Vehicles shifted, one of which dragged Lucky's buggy away from them. The two vivosaurs turned their attention from Morgan and trotted over to the twins. Jura started kicking his legs anxiously.

"This is bad, sis! Those Goyles took out Lucky's Ajka!" he shrieked, arms starting to shake. Oh, so his vivo was an Ajka. Good to know.

"We got this! Just sack Nibbles on 'em," Tria replied, reaching over to roll down the window so the vivosaur could jump out. Her brother smacked her hand.

"Are you crazy? Nibbles can't fight both of them! He's a sitting duck!" Lights seemed to turn on in Jura's head, and he quickly went to the monitor. After messing around with it for a moment, an image of Shrike popped up, and he slammed his hand against it.

With a _BANG!_ the furry winged pterosaur was flying about five feet above the ground, chittering happily. Tria shot him a questioning look.

"Okay, but why Shrike?"

"She's got the one skill that makes her fly really high. It'll help her get some relief from attacks."

Well, that _did_ seem to make sense. Tria leaned back and crossed her legs in a relaxed manner. "Alright, bro. You take care of this battle, then."

He nodded back, rolling down his window. "Will do." With a quick glance at the monitor for Shrike's attacks, he leaned out and shouted, "Middle Spear on the first Goyle!"

Trilling, Shrike dove down and drove her beak into the herbivore's side. It grunted, barely moving. They did appear to be quite tanky. Shrike circled around, returning to her original position. The Goyle she had struck simply squatted down, a glow overtaking its body. Jura mumbled something about increased attack.

The second Goyle lowered its head and charged. Jura hit the Defense ups, which they'd picked up not too long ago, a few times. Shrike actually flitted out of the way just in time to dodge, letting out taunting chirps as she flew overhead.

Jura took another peek at attacks, grinning as he noticed he had enough FP for a certain attack. That was probably the one he'd been talking about earlier.

"Shrike, use Wing Blaster on the second Goyle now!"

Her wings beat rapidly, the power of each stroke increasing as Jura spammed Attack ups. The second Goyle cringed, legs bracing as the wave of air hit it. The attack spread over to the first Goyle as well, but it merely nicked it.

Surprisingly, the first Goyle just sat there, allowing the second to go instead. However, that one just squatted down like the other had. Weird.

Tria couldn't help but laugh. "Guess they knew you weren't worth attacking, huh, bro?" She shot him a cocky grin, only to see his completely freaked out expression. Gall he was way too worried about everything.

Once again, he commanded Shrike into using Wing Blaster, boosting her attack way up. The only difference was that the attack focused on the first Goyle. It took the hit surprisingly well, probably thanks to that defense boost, and squatted down again.

However, unlike before, the glowing of its back turned into large projectiles. Shrike let out a surprised squawk and began trying to dodge around them. The sound of Jura clicking the Defense ups filled the air. That was probably good of him to do, since one of the bright beams nailed his Thalasso in the back. With a cry of pain, she struggled to stay airborne, floating back down to a more reachable level.

Luckily, the second Goyle didn't go in for the attack. Jura was getting noticeably more antsy. Nibbles leaned against him comfortingly. Those two were such saps.

Once again, Jura went for a Wing Blaster. By then they were almost out of Attack ups, so her bro decided against using them just yet. With a couple powerful flaps, the first Goyle was blown back into its gear. Jura let out a sigh of relief.

For some reason, despite the fact that Shrike was considerably high off the ground, the remaining Goyle went for a charge. Well, technically its fighter did, but still. It wasn't a smart move. And yet, it was still going for it.

Jura gave Shrike an LP Recovery for some reason. She really wouldn't need it. It wasn't like that Goyle was gonna hit her-

The Goyle jumped up, pushed off the front of their buggy, and sailed into the air, headbutting Shrike on its way through. It landed sort of awkwardly, but it survived the landing.

"Holy smokes!" Tria shouted, slamming her hands down on the dashboard. "That was the most gangster thing I've ever watched!"

"Yeah, well it's kind of not our vivosaur, so Shrike's gonna take it out now." Jura rolled his eyes as he leaned out the window. "Shrike, Middle Spear to finish it off!" The last few Attack ups went into Shrike's final flaps. The last Goyle dug its claws in, trying its best to brace itself for her final dive, but it was no use. The blue and white blur crashed into it, flashing it back into its green gear.

Circling around once more, Shrike lighted down upon the roof of their Bone Buggy, where she was retrieved by VR-00M. The Buggies across from them backed up, stunned that they'd been beat. Jura was just as surprised as they were, just a lot happier.

A stammered shout came in. "You think you're good? I wouldn't get so cozy if I were you!"

"Y-yeah! Those vivosaurs were just the ones we use for battle practice!" Another voice added in.

"Our _real_ vivosaurs won't be nearly such pushovers!" The first voice boasted, resentment filling his words. "So if you wanna save this so-called psychic wonder boy, you and that Warden with the bad haircut are gonna have to chase us down!"

Suddenly, their Buggies zoomed off after the one towing Lucky along, leaving Morgan and Leon with them. With his car wrecked, the best Leon could do in protest was to roll down his window and yell, "HEY! Get back here!" He paused a second, trying to think of comebacks and forgetting all of them. "...And my hair is _awesome_!"

He started grumbling to himself, but he was too far away for Tria to make any of it out. Judging by the way he was hitting his buggy, he ticked. And he sort of looked worried. That was a good sign.

Tria leaned over and nudged her brother. "Hey, cool battle and all, but can you go get Lucky's Ajka? I think we're gonna be heading back to the park." A quick glance back at Leon's smoking vehicle. "Just a weird hunch."

"Becky's gonna be upset," Jura replied as he started to get out. He sounded concerned, as expected.

"Well, no duh. We did screw up pretty badly. Well, Leon did, anyways."

He slammed the door shut right after she'd said that. Rude. Turning the steering wheel, Tria headed over to Leon. She pulled up next to him and rolled down her window. He was giving her a mixture of a glare and a look of sheer embarrassment.

"So, what the heck did you do?"

* * *

**Heyyyyyy, I updated at a reasonable time again. B) Hope you guys enjoyed the chapter. I'm only gonna promise reasonable update times for the next few chapters, since they all involve Lucky and Sean. After that we'll have to see. I'm just so happy right now. Double digit chapter numbers for the first time in a while. X3**

**So yeah, maybe leave a review, and I'll try for another chapter in a week maybe. ;)**


	11. Scolding and Rescues

Apparently Leon's screw up had started when he and Lucky had just made it to a spot to dig, and they were ambushed. One of the people rammed into Leon's Bone Buggy just right to make it unable to shoot out his Ptera, Scout, so that left Lucky's Ajka to fend for herself. She managed to take out one of the Goyles, but the remaining two ganged up on her and won.

After they'd figured all that out, Jura and Tria had to find a way to tow Leon's vehicle back to the Park so it could be fixed up, because goodness knows neither of them knew a thing about mechanics. Morton and Racer ended up pushing it while Jura drove their buggy forward as Tria sat in the back and directed the two of them. Leon stayed in his car the whole time, and Jura was just fine with that.

When they finally did get back, Leon's buggy went straight back to repair, then they had to report in that Lucky had gotten kidnapped. For once, Sean was actually nervous about something. He was saying something about getting his butt kicked in more ways than one, whatever that meant.

Then it was back to sitting around and waiting for Leon's buggy to get fixed up. It was around ten at that point. Lucky was, apparently, supposed to be heading home at eleven. This was obviously a problem. A problem which Leon was confronting by ranting about it.

"Those chumps won't get away with this!" he was yelling, pacing back and forth in front of the garage. Jura stood silently off to the side, Nibbles beside him, feeling rather awkward about being there. Tria didn't seem to care, but she never really cared about anything like that.

"As soon as my Bone Buggy's up and running, I'm gonna track 'em down!" he continued, "It's payback time! You hear me? PAYBACK TIME!"

Jura looked over to his sister, who was happily playing something on that phone she'd bought. He frowned, nudging her slightly. "Hey, uh, Leon's pretty mad, should we do something about that?"

"What?" She looked up at him, apathy apparent, turning her device off quick.

The redhead sighed. "I'm just saying, he doesn't really seem like he's learned his lesson here."

"Not sure I follow you, bro," Tria replied flatly, a blank look on her face. Jura rolled his eyes.

"Look, can you just tell him he's gotta work with us."

"Why don't you do it?"

He was immediately rigid. Oh heck no. Leon was like that bully at school who everyone talks smack about but no one has the guts to confront. At least, Jura didn't have them. But Tria did. Hence why he wanted her to talk for him.

But she seemed to reconsider after seeing his expression. "Fine!" she shouted, turning towards Leon. He was saying something about burning a gang to the ground. Weird. "Yo, Leon, you know you're gonna have to do all that with us, right?"

He didn't even bother to turn around. "Cram it! I don't need NOBODY'S help!" Jura couldn't help but jump at his exclamation. Man that guy was loud. "I'm going after 'em ALONE! Got it?! And don't try to follow me!"

"Gee, that worked out great," Tria sneered, rolling her eyes before looking back to Jura. "Any other bright ideas, bro?"

Well, for some reason he hadn't expected Leon to be as stubborn as he was. So no, he had no other 'bright ideas', not that he would admit it. There were some things worth being stubborn about, after all, but not letting people help you save a kidnapped kid was just stupid. Nibbles let out a quick snort that seemed to concur with his statement. Well, either that or he was just losing it.

And then, bless her slightly paranoid little soul, Becky came stomping out of America's HQ straight towards Leon. He hadn't even realized she was coming until she was standing right in front of him. It was sort of like how she'd been in Sean's office earlier, except about a hundred times more ticked off.

"Now you listen to me, Leon, and you listen good!" Despite the fact that she was probably a good foot shorter than him, the purple haired teen had gone completely silent, and actually looked sort of nervous. "You weren't up to the task last time, and Jura and Tria had to bail you out."

Leon glanced back at them briefly, almost as if he was looking for help. Jura had to bite back a smirk. This was extremely satisfying to watch.

Becky poked a finger to Leon's chest, immediately bringing his eyes back to her. "The only way this is gonna work is if you cooperate with those two." He gave a cross glance to the side, the thought of working with people overcoming his concern for his own safety.

"Look, the kidnappers said you'd have to challenge them together, right?" The blonde's hands went to her hips as she let the words sink in. "So if you don't work with Jura and Tria as a team, we'll never get Lucky back!"

He still didn't seem convinced. Maybe a little less defiant, but still unconvinced. And all that really did for him was tick Becky off more. Maybe her mother-henness was actually paying off.

"You _still_ want to go out there on your own?" Leon didn't answer, but his weakening glare said enough. Hands clutched into fists, and Becky blurted out in a louder than usual voice, "Is your head made of marshmallows or something!?"

Everyone was a little bit surprised by her sudden outburst, especially Leon. He stared at her, wide-eyed for a second, and barely managed to stammer out, "Hey, it's not…"

The two of them just stared at each other for a few moments, both flustered for different reasons. Then, Leon was quickly recomposing his bad boy image, crossing his arms and turning away from Becky, a glower returning to his face. He was trying so hard to look like he was deeply considering the matter, but it was fairly obvious, at least to Jura it was, that he wasn't going to go against Becky.

"Guess I don't have a choice," Leon grumbled out after a minute. While he sounded grouchy, Jura could tell he was still a bit embarrassed. The older teen grew silent again, though this time he was actually pondering something.

It took him a couple more minutes to sort that out before he continued. "You two and that vivosaur sure are stubborn. You know that?" For once, when Tria shot him a confused look, Jura reciprocated it. They had literally done nothing. He just yelled at them when Tria 'intervened'. He'd only really listened to Becky.

Holy smokes he was dodging around Becky, wasn't he. Flipping lone wolf Leon was pretending that her chewing him out didn't effect him in the slightest. He didn't maybe… Oh gosh.

About then Leon seemed to realize that everyone was following the same train of thought. He quickly turned to face the twins and, while he did appear to feel a bit awkward about the situation, his expression was significantly calmer than it had been about ten minutes earlier. He took a deep breath before starting.

"Alright, I think I've cleared my head," the purple haired teen admitted. "Heck, my runnin' off is what got us into this mess in the first place. And here I was, ready to go and make the same mistake again. What a sap." He glanced over to Becky briefly, who was beaming at her accomplishment. It was sort of funny, actually. Judging by his smile, Jura could only assume Leon agreed.

But then his sharp grey eyes fell directly on Jura, and all elements of humor he spotted in Leon vanished. He could joke about him like a pro, but gosh Leon still scared him half to death. But he was smirking now, only in a friendly sort of way.

"Sounds like we gotta partner up on this one, you two. Think you're up for it?"

Tria was back to being excited in less than a second. "Heck yeah we are!" Her eyes lit up, and she nudged her brother energetically. "Aren't we, Jura?"

Looking between the two of them, he decided that Leon probably wasn't going to beat him up, and grinned as well. "Yeah! Let's go get Lucky!" Nibbles let out a contained roar to portray his mirrored excitement.

Almost as if on cue, the lady from the garage came up. "You're Bone Buggy's all fixed up now."

"'Bout time!" Leon exclaimed, his tone lacking the harshness everyone had come to expect. The lady blinked a couple of times, surprised, but in the good kind of way. She smiled and headed back to the garage.

"Well, it seems like you guys have this under control," Becky concluded, walking over to the twins. She grinned, jokingly tagging on, "Keep an eye on Leon for us, will you?"

Said teen rolled his eyes before ushering her off, hands pushing on her shoulders. "Alright, you can leave now. Tell Chief not to tie himself in a knot."

"Alright, and good luck! I know you can do it!" Becky waved to them quick before jogging back towards the base. As soon as she was out of earshot, Leon faced toward his teammates, frowning instantly upon seeing their shared smirks.

He glowered at them lightly. "What are you two lookin' at? Let's saddle up and move out!" Then he was walking over to the garage, expecting the twins to follow. Which they did. As they stepped over to their respective Bone Buggies, Leon yelled to them eagerly, "We're gonna make those kidnappers with they'd never been BORN!"

Tria whooped and jumped up into the driver's seat, excitedly shifting. Jura climbed in a bit more reluctantly. She was gonna drive again. Fantastic. At least Nibbles was there for comfort.

He buckled in, his vivosaur clutched to his chest, as he waited for Tria to get going. Instead, she looked over to him, a bit perplexed.

"Hey, bro, you think we should call Nate?" she inquired after a moment, earning a blank stare from her sibling. No way. Tria had actually learned something? Man, everyone was changing today.

He nodded eagerly, giving the time a quick glance. It was about 10:15. 45 minutes to get Lucky back safe and sound. Also that was about… 1 in the morning in Asia. Hopefully Nate wouldn't be too ticked.

Luckily, Nate wasn't all that upset, and he showed up in a timely manner. In fact, he was pretty excited to see Leon again. Mainly because they'd been partners for the Warden Test. While Leon still seemed less than ecstatic to talk with Nate, they were getting along better than before.

But there wasn't a lot of time to just sit around and catch up. They set off into Goldrush Canyon, Leon in the lead since he had an idea of where they were going. "I'll bet my badge they're at Mt. Dinomore," he'd said, "That place is crammed to the gills with rare fossils."

The path up to it was a bit treacherous, and Jura found himself squeezing his eyes shut to ignore how far they were off the ground. Tria had reassured him several times already that even if they fell they'd be fine. Apparently Bone Buggies were built strong enough to survive falling very large distances. He didn't want to test out if they actually could.

And yet, despite the strong winds and occasional pterosaur making a dive at them, they made it up relatively unscathed. Once they had reached the top of the final ramp, at the very back of Mt. Dinomore's plateau were four Bone Buggies. Three of them surrounded the last, which was obviously Lucky's.

Right about then, the monitor changed over to the interior of a Buggy. The top half of Lucky's head was visible as he looked into the screen. Of course, all he was really doing was whimpering. The kidnappers were yelling at him over the radio, after all.

"C'mon, kid! Get out and find us some rare fossils!"

"And don't be wastin' our time with no second-rate garbage, either!"

"Don't make us come in there!"

The small redhead squealed and ducked down further, his face disappearing completely. He barely managed to stammer out, "H-help me!"

"They're really puttin' the screws to the poor kid," Leon mused, his face coming up on the monitor as well, putting it into a split screen. Nate's came up seconds later, splitting the view further.

"Then let's go kick their butts!" the pink haired teen cheered, revving his engine for emphasis. Well, they had the kidnappers' attention now. The three of them turned their vehicles towards them, obviously ready for a fossil battle.

Tria leaned back and snorted. "Way to flipping go, Nate."

He laughed awkwardly, but Leon was the next to talk. At least he was focused for some reason. "All right, you sad sacks! Hand Lucky over or else!"

There was mocking laughter over the radio suddenly, accompanied by the frightened babbling of Lucky as he repeatedly thanked them for not leaving him for dead. Jura was surprised at how upset he was. Sure, Lucky was only nine, but he'd been so cocky before that it seemed wrong somehow that he was in tears.

"I thought I told you to make like a bakery truck and haul buns!" One of them yelled, and with a bit more cackling, Dino Gears were flashing into the air. Purple skinned with terrible looking grey spines protruding from their backs, as well as a grey armor over their heads, the three bipeds stood around nine feet tall and 30 feet long.

More bursts of light went off, and Leon's Ptera, Scout, and Nate's Edapho, Aito, flashed onto the field. Scout was yellow furred with white patches outlined in light blue. He was just a bit larger than Shrike, what with his 18 foot wingspan, but with a much smaller crest. Aito was probably a bit shorter than Scout, if you counted his sail, with vibrant green scales and a splash of rainbow up said sail. His body was around six feet long, which was a bit smaller than average.

Tria slammed her hand down on the monitor. "DIBS!" Morton's gear was launched, and morphed on to the field. The giant Titano AR dwarfed all the other vivosaurs, any one of his feet probably capable of squashing his teammates with ease.

So far things were looking good for them. All three of the kidnappers were using a Beckles, which was definitely a strong vivosaur, but they all attacked the same way. It was just a poor strategy in general. Jura let out a relieved sigh. They could definitely save Lucky without any more problems.

Scout was, obviously, the fastest, and therefore went first. He dove at the first Beckles, grazing it sharply. The Ptera had barely finished his attack when the biped slammed its bony, grey protrusions into his chest. Luckily, Scout beat his wings extra hard when the Beckles brought its head up, so the impact was lessened by a bit.

Then, as the pterosaur retreated, that same Beckles charged Morton. Its large maw slammed shut around the sauropod's neck, crunching against his armor. The Titano AR grunted, shouldering his attacker loose.

Before the attacking Beckles had a chance to recover, Aito was latched onto its arm. As it swung the appendage up in an attempt to shake it free, the Edapho released it and dug his nails into the Beckles' neck. His maw clamped down on its throat skin once more, only to be thrown off. Then, as he landed, Aito dug his front left foot into the ground, gyrating and slicing the Beckles with his sail. With a burst of light, it was back to a gear.

Holy smokes that was easy. Jura felt his nerves ease up a bit more. He stole a glance over to his sister, who was still looking as calm and excited as ever. Sometimes he thought it would be nice to be as confident as her.

His thoughts were interrupted as Morton's head was suddenly right in front of their window. In fact, he may have squealed just a little bit. What the heck had happened?

Nate's voice came in. "Pay attention, you two! You're lucky I was, Morton would've been a goner!"

The second Beckles had attacked Morton, which had flipped him around. Of course, he was at low health after the Beastly Bite from the first Beckles, and the following Tail Strike would have knocked him out had it not been for Nate's LP Recovery. Jura wasn't sure why Tria hadn't told him to use one, but maybe she had zoned out like he had.

Either way, he thanked Nate profusely, and Tria rolled down her window to tell Morton what to do. "Drop Press on the second, err, first one now!" she yelled, Jura catching on to her plan moments later. The Beckles that had attacked Morton had left itself in a bad stance. Without a second thought, he was spamming Attack Ups, as were their teammates.

Morton turned around, lumbering over towards the Beckles he was to attack. His ginormous neck bent backwards, then whipped straight down. With a few hundred pounds of neck muscle slamming into it, plus the bad stance, the carnivore roared in pain and vanished from sight. It was only when Morton lifted his head up from the ground did a small, green dino gear become visible.

Of course, now Morton was in a bad stance, so as cool as that one-shot had been, his vulnerability made Jura worried. Then again, it didn't take a lot to get him worried. Things could take a turn for the worse, especially with only one Beckles left. It might get desperate and perform better.

Lowering its head, the last Beckles hurtled towards Morton. Jura slammed his find on the Defense up button, and Nate provided another LP Recovery. Then, the carnivore flicked its spine and slammed the top of its head into the side of Morton's. The large sauropod took the hit, but he staggered about, disoriented. Oh boy. That wasn't good.

Thankfully Leon was ready to jump right in and attack. Scout went in for another dive, which was boosted quite a bit. This time he was ready for the counter, and he pulled back just in time to minimize the damage. Unfortunately, his back-flapping left him at an awkward angle for dodging, and a large, spindle-covered tail spun around and smacked him upside the head. LP from Nate left the Ptera in the battle, but he was still weakened significantly from the blow.

The Beckles' fighter had gotten desperate, but in a way that screwed up his strategizing. Now their final opponent was in a poor stance, and it was Nate's move. Aito squirmed with delight, hindquarters tensing.

He aimed, scurried toward the Beckles, then took a gigantic leap. His head smacked into the carnivore's flank, bowling it over and popping it back into its gear. Then there was victorious roaring and shrieking, along with a rank up for Morton, putting him up to rank 6.

Jura and Tria high-fived, and Nate's cheering echoed through their radio. They kicked those kidnappers' butts in about ten minutes. Nice.

Speaking of the kidnappers, they were in a state of panic. Too shocked about their defeat to think properly, all they could do was scream and drive off at top speed, leaving their hostage behind. Lucky's teary-eyed face appeared on the monitor.

"Thank you, thank you, thank you!" he squealed, starting to cry a bit out of sheer joy. "I was so scared, and they were so mean- I just don't know what I would've done if you hadn't come for me!" Then, suddenly, the kid who had been so cocky before was breaking down into full-blown sobs, sputtering about his 'Mum and Da' and Morgan. It seemed like it would be a better idea to get him back to the Park before talking him down. Maybe being out in the dig site was a bit overwhelming still.

* * *

They had to take a quick stop in Asia first, of course, because Prof. Little was taking care of Morgan's injuries. For some reason he had been up working on stuff, which was just fine for the Ajka. She was healing fairly well already.

Picking her up had been interesting. Lucky calmed down a lot with her back, and he had a chat with Little concerning hobbies. They'd never met before, which was surprising what with Lucky's frequent visits to all the parks. But they seemed to hit it off quite nicely despite the large gap in maturity.

Then it was back to America to see Sean before Lucky was sent home. It had sounded like a check-in when they were told to stop by, but it turned more into a cover-up conspiracy than anything else.

"So here's the dealio, Luckster," Sean was saying to the psychic in a low voice, "If you tell your parents you got kidnapped, you'll never leave their sight, like, ever. So if you clam up, we can both stay groovy. You dig?" He did one of his grin and thumbs-up combos for reinforcement. Lucky nodded after a moment.

"You bet! I mean, it was scary, but everything worked out like I knew it would." Lucky ended his reasoning with a grin as well. Sean ruffled his hair up, giving him a pat on the back to send him off.

"Atta boy. Tell your dad I said 'hi'!" Lucky nodded, then bolted off without another word. He was sort of rude, but his concerns lied with not getting grounded. Which was perfectly reasonable.

With Lucky gone, a tension settled in the room that everyone but Sean was feeling. Leon was concerned about whether or not he was still a Warden, and to an extent so was Jura. He assumed his sister and Becky were as well.

But, when Sean turned towards them, he still had that big grin of his. "Duuuuude! You guys totally KILLED IT!" Jura could have sworn there were stars in his eyes. How the heck did he manage to stay so excited?

It took a few moments for the blond to settle down enough for serious conversing. "It's a shame people have to be so unrighteous in a sweet park like this, y'know?" He rocked back on the heels of his boots, trying to think of intelligent-sounding analogies. "I guess there's, like, evil lurking around every corner of this old world. Anyway, now things around here can be totally chill again, thanks to you!"

Becky nudged him, motioning towards the three Wardens across from them. Sean stared at them in awkward silence for a while, quite perplexed about what he'd forgotten. Then lights turned on in his head, and he was getting out what looked like his Warden license, muttering to himself and tapping at it like he had no idea what to do. And then after five minutes or so, Becky was helping him navigate, so apparently he didn't know what he was doing.

Finally, there was dinging from what Jura assumed were his and Leon's licenses. Sure enough, they'd gotten some points, and his and Tria's Warden Rank had gone up to 4. They high-fived, and Jura noticed he had accepted their joint license predicament. After all, they'd probably be split up at some point.

Of course, that wasn't the end of the 'meeting'. "Yeah, so I think you guys're more than ready for me to open up the Goldrush Canyon Challenge Routes," Sean stated confidently, handing his license to his sister as he said it. It was pretty obvious he'd given up on figuring that out.

For once, Jura had no idea what he was talking about, and glanced over to Tria and Leon for an answer. Both of of them looked equally confused. Sean looked at each of them briefly, groaning and smacking his hand against his forehead.

"Oh man! I totally spaced telling you guys about Challenge Routes, didn't I?" He sounded more frustrated about his forgetfulness than usual. All the stress from the Lucky incident must have got to him. But, as per usual, the branch leader moved on from it quickly and just jumped straight into explaining.

"Basically, there're these huge gates with mondo rare fossils behind 'em, but they're locked up because these bogus rogue vivos called Fossil Eaters hang around 'em. And they eat the fossils. It's really messed up and junk, so we just let peeps who can handle themselves in."

There was a brief pause as Sean double-checked his info to make sure he didn't miss anything. Then he threw in a grin and a thumbs-up for recovery. "Got it?" The three teens nodded. "Groovy!"

Another little ding went off, and a message popped up on the license that basically said they had access to the Challenge Routes. Maybe he and Tria could swing by one of those and give it a look. They sounded interesting.

"You guys are amazing! I couldn't be more impressed!" Becky beamed. Her talking basically translated to 'there were things to be done still'. Leon reacted well to her praise, big shocker. "Oh, I almost forgot!" She literally froze, then shoved Sean playfully. "Gosh, you're rubbing off on me. Anyways, the Captain called. He said your next assignment's in Fossil Park Europe. Also, just a reminder that they're ahead of us by 8 hours, so you should probably head over there around midnight."

"Gosh that's late," Tria moaned, head tilting back. "You guys are so cool! I'm gonna miss you!"

Sean walked up to both her and Jura, putting an arm around both of their necks. Which was a bit weird because of their varying heights. "I'll miss you guys, too. Don't die or anything weird, alright?"

"We'll, uh, try not to do that…?" Jura managed to reply, albeit awkwardly. Why would they die? Like, why would anyone feel the need to say that? Whatever. This _was_ Sean after all.

The branch leader gave them a quick shove towards the door, following it up with a wave. "Have fun with the resident lovebirds!"

The doors whisked shut behind them, and the twins began their descent, Nibbles in tow. Leon hadn't followed them, so Jura assumed he was either getting chewed out or fired. Something along those lines.

They entered the lobby just in time to see Lucky hopping back out of the World Gate, a grin stretching over his face upon spotting the two of them. He ran over, eyes wide and brimming with joy. Morgan popped out seconds later, scrambling to keep up. "Oh, hey guys! I was just coming back over to say thanks! Mum said I could real quick."

"Well, you're welcome," Jura chuckled lightly. Morgan gave Lucky a stern look, and the kid suddenly stared down at his feet, shifting them awkwardly.

"Sorry if I sounded kinda cocky when we first met," he apologized, tapping his fingers together as he thought it through. "I kinda feel invincible most of the time. Everyone sorta protects me all the time, and my psychic powers let me know how everything'll turn out."

Tria brought up her hands to stop him. "Hold up, I got a question about your psychic-ness." All eyes went to her. "Do you, like, see pictures or what?"

"I get feelings about things," Lucky brightened up, glad to move on from his apology. "Like, when I met you guys, you felt safe, and Leon kinda felt… mean, I guess. Or when I find fossils, I get this feeling that some are really good! It's not all that impressive, really. Mum's _way_ better than I am!"

For some reason Jura was getting the feeling that Lucky's mom wasn't as good as he thought, because how the heck would he have ended up digging if she would have known he was gonna get kidnapped. Still, he figured it would be rude to call a little kid out about their views of their parents, especially their parents he'd never met before, so he let it slide.

A simple, "Well, I'd say you're pretty impressive," came in reply from Jura instead. No need to make anything offensive. Lucky really appreciated his comment. His features were basically glowing with excitement.

"You're so nice! Let's be Paleo Pals!"

Then there was the super fun process that followed which consisted of figuring out how to register Lucky. Fellow Wardens were easy, because they had sort of a database of them. He was not a Warden, so there was some weird thing about syncing Lucky's device that let him get just about everywhere a Warden could to theirs.

Once they'd sorted that out, Lucky was off to Europe again. He mentioned in parting that if they ever went out digging with him again, he would help them find new fossils. Which was a very tempting offer. Maybe they would have to take him up on it.

Jura and Tria were just about to head to the cafeteria for lunch when, lo and behold, Leon finally came out of Sean's office. He didn't look all that upset, so things must have gone well for him. It probably wouldn't hurt to ask, though, and Jura figured by then he could muster up enough courage to do just that.

He strode up to the purple haired teen the best he could, taking a second to clear his throat. "So, uh, how'd things go?"

Leon just shrugged. "Alright, I guess. I've still got a job, and Becks didn't chew me out too bad."

"Because we all know how much you hate it when she does that," Tria chimed in, snickering slightly. Jura found himself sniggering along despite his efforts.

He seemed a bit embarrassed by their harassment, but he brushed it off better than expected. "Yeah, yeah, you're flippin' hilarious, Tria." He frowned suddenly, appearing a bit more serious "So look. I'm not very good at this kind of thing, but… thanks for the help."

Holy smokes, Leon just said thanks. This was it. The apocalypse was coming. The world had lost all balance.

"If not for you two, those perps woulda mopped the floor with me," Leon continued, albeit more reluctantly. That sounded a bit more natural. "I used to think Fossil Battles were all about individual strength and wits, you know? I guess I kinda see there's more to it now." He paused, clearing his throat and trying to get a more stern look to him. "Anyways, you wanna be Paleo Pals or what? Err… If you want."

It was at that point that Jura and Tria decided simultaneously to mess with him. They both shared reluctant looks, trying their best to make it look like neither of them were interested, but they didn't want to hurt his feelings. It took less than ten seconds for Leon to start glaring at them.

"Have I mentioned you two are flippin' hilarious?" he sighed, crossing his arms and glancing off to the side. His tough act wore off pretty fast, though. "I deserve it though, don't I?"

Tria cackled in reply. "Heck yeah you do!" Jura joined in after a bit, and even Leon couldn't help but chuckle just a bit.

Eventually the redheaded twin managed to stop laughing. With a friendly smile, he looked straight at Leon and answered, "Anyways, yeah, we can be Paleo Pals."

"Nice."

* * *

**I've updated weekly pretty consistently. I'm so proud. ;-; We're getting into character development now and it motivates me. Also writing this much burns me out in everything else, so I might need to stop with these fast updates soon. We'll have to see. For now they're staying as long as my favorite characters are involved, and they are for a long time, so no worries. They also motivate me. XD**

**Just as a heads up, though, there definitely won't be an update by next weekend, because I've got flipping exams, then I'm going off to snow camp over the weekend. So yeah. Maybe the Monday or Tuesday afterwards? I dunno. We'll see how busy I am. Usually I work overtime with writing over the weekends, since I mainly type from 10-12 at night, and I don't have to worry about getting up early the morning after.**


	12. Viking and Witches

Heading out at midnight was easier said than done. There was packing and junk to do, and frankly Tria really just wanted to try out a Challenge Route. She managed to convince Jura to go out, then called up Nate and Penny. Sure, they'd gotten Nate a couple hours ago, but this was important.

And holy smokes was it worth it. There were tons of twists and turns, and you had to drive really fast. Sure, Jura was screaming the whole time, but hey, they got a full body's worth of gold fossils for Morton after they fought another Titano AR. They were really badly cleaned, but Titano ARs were flipping huge. She was lucky just to get the parts.

But, after that, she was willing to get her stuff together. She'd managed to accumulate a lot over the course of a week. Mainly video games and various chargers. Nothing really productive or anything.

The only really hard part was going to bed early so that midnight was not so daunting of a wake up time. Tria generally liked staying up late, so going to sleep at like five in the afternoon was horrible. She basically just laid in bed and stared at the ceiling for two hours until finally, out of sheer boredom, she just zonked out.

Next thing she knew, Jura was knocking on the door and telling her to get up. And, while she was still really groggy, anything beat sleeping. All this travelling was really screwing her sleeping schedule over. Maybe they could make a complaint to Stryker or something.

But they weren't heading to Asia, they were heading to Europe, so complaining would have to wait. Tria flopped out of bed and picked up her suitcase after tripping over it. Then, grumbling about how stupid time zones are, she staggered out the door.

"I thought you said you weren't tired," Jura stated as they walked down the hall together. Tria just glared at him. Stupid know it all. Couldn't he just shut his mouth and respect basic grogginess?

Well, he did shut his mouth, so that was a start. Then it was pure silence all the way up to the World Gate. Jura scanned the license and they were off. The teleporting still felt all weird and nauseating.

Feet hit the ground, and suddenly she was blinking rapidly to adjust to the brightness that was there. That's right, it was morning in Europe. Nibbles still managed to be completely unaffected by the changes. Flipping eyesore.

Once her eyes had adjusted, Europe's HQ didn't seem so bad. The floor was tiled in tan with a long, crimson carpet stretching from the elevator to the front doors. Sean was literally the only person who hadn't installed an elevator, and it was getting funnier by the moment, especially since this place looked so ancient.

"Hey, guys!"

Eyes shifted back towards the elevator. Lucky was running over to them, probably having just gotten off of it, brimming with excitement. Morgan was, strangely enough, nowhere in sight. He must have ditched her somehow. Maybe he got in the elevator first or something.

He stopped in front of the twins, dancing from foot to foot. "Oh my gosh! You're actually here right now!" Tria wasn't exactly sure what was so earth-shattering about that, but she figured it would be mean to crush his little spirit.

"Uh, heck yeah we're here." She smiled, but her voice didn't have a ton of enthusiasm. It lacked sarcasm; that was all she was willing to change.

Then the elevator opened and out came Morgan with another person in tow. She was probably a little older than Sean, and had an obvious witch-y flair to her, what with the pointy hat and wand. Lavender hair, which was really curly, violet colored double breasted coat, pink leggings, purple and black boots; yep, definitely a theme there.

Both of them made a beeline to Lucky, and holy smokes was that witch lady short. Sure, she was taller than Tria, but Lucky's head was up to her shoulders. It just seemed weird.

Despite the vaguely cross look to her, Lucky seemed perfectly happy to see her. His gold eyes shone with excitement. "Mum! Hey, look, you called it, see!?" He pointed at the twins, bouncing up and down.

Tria blinked a couple of times out of disbelief. Gosh, when Lucky had talked about his mom she'd pictured someone older. And who, you know, actually looked sort of like him. He must've been adopted or something.

There was a brief moment where Lucky's 'Mum' appeared torn between chewing him out over something or welcoming them. She seemed to decide on welcoming, and her entire demeanor brightened up. "You're Jura and Tria, right? My fortune-telling ability accurately predicted you were coming about now! I do so love when that happens…" Gosh, she sounded more English than Lucky.

She tapped at her chin with her wand, magenta eyes widening with realization. "And I forgot to introduce myself. Good bloody job, me. Anyways, I'm Violet-" she stopped to 'tap' Lucky on the head with her wand, to which he whined "-and this lovable little _bugger_ is my kid, Lucky, but I'm sure you know that."

"Nice to meet you," Jura beamed, trying to look extra happy because she counted as an adult. Gosh darn her brother, trying to impress adults for some reason. Most of these people weren't _that_ much older than them. Ten years tops.

Lucky tugged at Violet's sleeve. "Are we gonna show them around?" he asked, sounding hopeful. She still had a bit of an annoyed look to her when she looked down to him.

"As long as you don't try to sneak off again, alright?" The small redhead nodded eagerly, and immediately she wasn't mad anymore. Turning back to the twins, Violet grinned and started tapping her wand against her hand. "Okay, so we're gonna give you a tour then. Fossil Park Europe's as good as it gets, after all. I _predict_ you'll love it!" Then she and Lucky were snickering, and holy smokes that was probably the worst pun Tria had ever heard.

So bad, in fact, that she couldn't help but comment on it. "With jokes like that, how could I not?" Surprisingly, both of them laughed at her response. Tria was almost confused, but then it dawned on her they were both flipping _British_, and sarcasm was like 99% of their humor. Finally, her people.

Violet had barely taken a step towards the front door when she stopped. "Almost forgot!' She motioned over to the elevator with her wand. "I've gotta introduce you to Drake first, seeing as he's in charge here and all. Oh, and heads up, his office is sort of cold."

A quick elevator ride ensued, and they were up in Drake's office. Tan flooring, sort of like the stuff in the lobby, was topped off with a grey couch and a grandfather clock, not to mention the large wooden desk in the middle. Sitting behind it in a hunched up anxious sort of way was Drake. He was pretty obviously Norwegian, and the viking helmet and outfit were just sort of emphasizing it, not to mention his messy blond hair.

Also, Violet was right, it was really cold in there. Tria was getting the distinct feeling it was because this guy was seriously overdressed for the summer weather. She tried to rub her arms for warmth as inconspicuously as possible.

"Hi, Drakey!" Violet sounded very affectionate to say the least. Pulling him into a hug, she gave him a quick peck on the cheek, his face lighting up red as he became rather flustered.

"U-um… H-hi, Violet…" Drake mumbled, his quiet voice muffled even more by his accent. He brought up a shaky hand to one of Violet's, smiling nervously. Meanwhile, Lucky was getting that disgusted look that kids get when they see their parents being lovey-dovey.

After a few more seconds, Violet's arms slid loose and she returned to just standing next to him. They were still holding hands though. Tria fought the urge to roll her eyes. She could understand Lucky's disgust; he probably dealt with this a lot.

But, apart from the hand-holding, the unusual pair looked to be done with their romantic junk. Back to business. "These are the new Wardens the Captain told you about!" the small witch beamed, gesturing to Jura and Tria. Jura straightened up and, just because she felt like ticking off her brother, Tria slouched more. He started glaring. Man she was good.

"Oh! Um… h-hello. I'm Drake…" the blond barely managed to stammer out. His gaze dropped from the twins to his desk. "I'm the l-leader of the… the European branch. Um, I guess… Not sure how that happened…"

Violet gave his hand a comforting squeeze. "Aww, don't mind our Drake. He's pretty shy."

"Except when he gets excited!" Lucky butted in, looking exceptionally excited himself. "Then he's a bloody maniac!" A stern look was cast to him from his mother. He huffed, crossing his arms. "_Bloomin'_ maniac, sorry."

Drake shifted uncomfortably at the comment, more embarrassed than anything. Tria failed to see how he was capable of being a 'maniac', especially because his attempts at social interaction. Then again, she didn't think Sean was capable of getting mad either, and Leon had disproved that theory. So maybe she'd give him the benefit of the doubt this time.

For the moment she was mostly in doubt, especially since it looked like Drake was trying to muster up the strength to talk again. "Yeah, so, um…I-I think we sh-should have these two learn more a-about Fossil Park Europe…" Again, his gaze wandered away from the twins to some other random part of the room. "I mean, if… if that's okay…"

"Doesn't matter if it's not okay, you're the boss!" Violet chirped, making the blond flinch. Wow, he must really not like making people uncomfortable. "What you want 'em to do?" They exchanged looks briefly, then it seemed Violet took over as leader briefly. "Well, we should probably send 'em out to a dig site or something, right? Yodel Hills, maybe?"

The viking shifted again upon realizing he would have to talk. "Err, um… O-okay…"

"Great! It's settled then." Hands clasped and the lavender haired witch turned back to Jura and Tria. "You two can go to Yodel Hills, which is a pretty darn great place if I do say so myself."

Lucky had meandered over to her side and was starting to tug at her sleeve again. "Can I go out with 'em, Mum? _Pleeeaaase_?" He tried out his best puppy-dog eyes, pulling on the dark purple fabric a few more times.

The stare down lasted until Violet finally caved. "Alright, just don't get into trouble." She looked a bit doubtful, but Lucky's excitement seemed to quell it.

"Y-yeah, so, um…" Drake tapped his fingers together, eyes refusing to even glance up at Jura and Tria. "When y-you're done at… at Yodel Hills, you should come back here. I-I mean, if that's okay…"

Tria was shocked to find she was actually starting to feel sorry for this guy. He was like twenty times worse than Jura. She shot him her biggest smile in an attempt to make him feel a bit better. "Yeah, sure! We'd be glad!" A quick nudge to her brother. "Right, Jura?"

He nodded eagerly, and Drake smiled just a bit. "I'll be h-here… I'm always here…" The blonde stared directly down at his lap out of embarrassment. "Sometimes I h-hide under the desk…"

At that point Tria wasn't all that surprised. She nodded awkwardly just as Lucky shot by her to the elevator, snagging her hand on the way by. "C'mon, Tria! I wanna go do fun stuff!" His enthusiasm was a refreshing break from Jura, so she was happy to follow him.

A weird scrabbling sound came after them as Morgan tried to jog after them. She slid to a stop against Lucky's legs, beaming up at him, to which the small boy patted her on the head. Those two were weirdly attached. Like, Jura and Nibbles drinking out of the same water bottle was one thing, but Lucky and Morgan felt close on some other, stranger level. Maybe like sharing underwear close? Well, Morgan didn't wear underwear, but maybe figurative ones.

Well, however close they were, they were going out digging with her and Jura, so it was probably best not to think about vivosaurs in underwear, figurative or otherwise. Lucky had dragged her all the way to garage in a pretty short amount of time. Jura was right behind them, of course. They just needed to call a third someone up.

Jura decided on Penny, since they hadn't seen her in a while, and she was able to come up. So, while they waited for the blonde to get to Europe, the three of them, five if they counted Nibbles and Morgan, started to chat a bit while they sat on the hoods of their Bone Buggies.

As usual, Jura started it up. "So… Your parents are pretty interesting," he began, words coming out slower as tried to phrase it in a way that wouldn't offend Lucky. The small psychic groaned and leaned his head back.

"They're so gross!" Lucky whined, cheeks puffing out from frustration. "They've been married almost a year now, you'd think they'd be over it by now."

Tria tried really hard not to laugh. He was so naive it was hilarious. "Dude, I'm pretty sure it takes more than a year for that to happen." Despite her efforts, a large grin had forced its way on to her face.

The psychic was shocked. "Seriously?! Man, that stinks…" Arms crossed as Lucky's gaze dropped to Morgan. The two stared at each other for a moment before the boy groaned again. "All this lovey stuff is a load of garbage." He paused to stick his tongue out. "I'm never gonna get into it."

"Give it a few years, you'll change your mind," Jura piped up, sounding a bit grouchy himself. Tria was tempted to point out that she had yet to have crushes on anyone, as he was suggesting, but she figured guys might be different. They were already weird, so hey, weird mushy thoughts weren't all that far-fetched. Just look at Leon..

Lucky was looking stubbornly doubtful, but he kept whatever he was thinking to himself. Which was good. Arguing with little kids never worked out well, and knowing him they'd just get a crap ton of sass anyways.

Around then Penny's head poked into the doorway and she mumbled a soft, "Hello…" Jura smiled and slid off the buggy to go greet her.

"Hey, Penny! Hope we didn't interrupt anything important," he said jokingly, to which she laughed. Her hands folded together as she twiddled her fingers.

"Oh, nothing too big." She grinned suddenly, suppressing a laugh. "Nate got his foot stuck in one of Prof. Little's contraptions."

Tria broke out in full blown cackling, flopping down on her back. "How the heck did he do that?!" That was such a stupid thing to picture. Nate with something that was probably dangerous stuck to his foot and everyone trying to get it off.

"Well, I told him not to, but he seemed convinced nothing would happen."

"Yeah, that sounds like Nate," Jura chuckled. He was trying to ignore Tria's laughter, but she was trying to be obnoxious enough to get him to acknowledge her. That was her sole goal in life: to annoy Jura.

After a while, Jura still hadn't laughed and the thing with Nate was no longer as funny. Tria had to admit defeat. Their little group headed out to Yodel Hills, barely making it out on the road when there was ringing and Violet popped up on the monitor.

"Hey, you're finally made it out!" she chirped, trying to look excited. It wasn't really working; she still looked pretty stressed. "How's Lucky doing?"

The psychic's groaning filled the speaker. "Mum, I'm fine! Just lemme dig up some fossils!"

Violet tittered at his comment, twirling her wand almost as if to distract herself from it. "Look, so we've got some fast rogues around here. Really zippy little buggers. Make sure they don't sneak up on Lucky."

"Morgan would take care of them, Mum!"

"Just look out for them, alright?"

"Mum!"

"And head back to Drake's Office when you're done. He'll get all worried and stuff if you don't." She hung up after that last remark, the sound of Lucky groaning replacing her voice.

Tria broke out in snickers. "Cheer up, man. You'll live." Lucky didn't seem all that convinced.

"If the worst thing that ever happens to you is your mom being overprotective, you'll have a great life," Jura added in confidently. "Maybe even free food well into your 20s. That sounds really nice, actually."

At that point, Tria made an executive decision to just head out and do stuff, because gosh darn it sitting around and complaining was boring. So, with Jura back to screeching like the big baby he was, she sped off into the dig site, Lucky cheering and racing after her. That kid moved on from things fast.

* * *

Yodel Hills _was_ pretty nice, point for Violet there. Lots of vivosaurs, lots of paved roads, lots of _jumps_. Gosh Jura had hated those jumps, but they were there and frankly Tria didn't want them to go to waste. She'd gone right over a Diplo, as Jura had called it, and said brother had almost peed his pants. It was awesome.

Besides the reckless driving and obvious Fossil Battles with rogues, they did actually dig up some fossils. Tria got herself a Carchar, a weird stone-banana-shark-looking biped, that she had named Ramid, and Jura got an Ankylo BO, who had a very unfortunate species name and looked like a pincushion, that he named Capper. Neither of them really planned on using them anytime soon, what with the five vivosaurs they already had being used frequently, but hey, maybe if they got busy enough with Fossil Battles at some point they could switch them in.

Penny had mentioned something about Hypsi fossils being in the area as well, so Tria figured it couldn't hurt to find some of those for her. With some help from Lucky, they did manage to scrape up every part for Penny's Hypsi, who was apparently named 'Alto'. He was definitely not lying when he said he could help them find fossils.

Around the early afternoon, Penny had to head back to Asia because they were still seven hours ahead of Europe and she still needed to get some dinner and sleep. It seemed like a good time to hit up some Seven Scrambles after that, because Tria really didn't feel like heading back into Drake's freezing cold office just yet. Lucky went along with her and Jura, then they called Roland for slot number three. Nate and Penny had both been bugged in the last twenty-four hours, so it was his turn.

Unfortunately Roland also wanted sleep and food, so they could only do those for about an hour. Tria was still vehemently opposed to getting cold in Drake's office, so she suggested some missionator jobs. So they headed back out to Yodel Hills and dug up some bones and captured some rogues. That took up another couple hours.

Jura started to complain about being hungry, so Tria jumped at that opportunity to continue procrastinating. They went to some random fast food place and got some fish and chips. But the chips were french fries. Europeans were weird. At least the food still tasted good. Nibbles especially liked the fish.

Finally they were out of things to do, and Tria admitted that they had to go check in. So it was back to the elevator, hoping and praying that Drake had also left for some supper. When they got to his office, Tria was almost happy for a second if she ignored the overwhelming AC. She only saw Violet with Lucky, who had ditched them when they had gone to get food. No Drake. Wait, hadn't he said something about hiding under his desk…?

"Drakey, they're back!"

Sure enough, there were those stupid horns on that dorky helmet of his poking up over the desk. Then the blond viking was awkwardly climbing back into his throne-esque chair, hugging himself nervously. It was actually kind of funny how shy he was, now that Tria was thinking about it. He was pretty tall and looked pretty strong. Then again, Jura was pretty tall and look at what a mess he was.

"Welcome back!" And there was Violet, getting her back on track. "Did you like it? That scenery's really something, huh?"

"_You mean the scenery I didn't look at? Yeah, it was fantastic," _ Tria thought to herself sarcastically. She nodded anyways, though, and so did Jura. Like he actually looked at it either amidst his panic attack.

She wasn't actually sure if Violet believed them or not, but either way the small witch smiled. "Well then, back to my explanation of this park."

"A-actually, um…" Drake looked like he was about to have a heart attack after technically cutting his wife off. "I-I don't want to interrupt, r-really, but… P-Prescott reported that the Speed Fiends sh-showed up again"

Jura was already looking scared. "The Speed Fiends?" He murmured, glancing over to his sister for support. Tria scoffed, rolling her eyes in an attempt to tell him to shut up.

"Why doesn't he ever actually do anything about the Speed Fiends?" Violet grumbled, crossing her arms and appearing rather ticked. "Gosh I hate those guys. Driving around dig sites, thinking they're all that, and they do it at terribly unsafe speeds!" She looked down at Lucky quickly, which gave Tria the impression that he was the only reason she hated those guys. But that wasn't why, apparently.

"What a bunch of arseheads."

Lucky broke out in snickers at his mother's remark, and Tria literally bit her tongue to avoid laughing. She found it especially funny that out of everyone, Drake didn't seem all that phased by her comment. Though based on how stressed he always seemed, maybe he was just too concerned about the Speed Fiends to notice. Nah. Violet probably swore all the time.

Actually, that probably wasn't too far-fetched of a thought because Drake just responded with, "Indeed." His fingers started tapping together and, once again, his gaze fell to his desk. "A-anyways, I thought that m-maybe Jura and Tria could… do something a-about it?"

"Just gonna throw the new Wardens in the bloody fire, huh?" Violet smirked, a joking tone to her voice. Drake either failed to pick up on it or just felt guilty by nature, and immediately began listing off excuses.

"Um, w-well, e-everyone is busy, and I…" A nervous glance was cast to the side. "I'm busy to. And stuff…"

Yeah that last one sounded more like he didn't want to go than he couldn't go. Still, Violet was more than happy to cover for him.

"Oh well, what can you do?" the witch shrugged, grinning. "Looks like you guys and me will-" A pause, followed by tittering. "-_not _be taking care of this together because I'm also swamped. So it's all on you guys."

"W-we can… count on you, right? P-please?"

It always did feel nice to have people counting on you. Tria puffed out her chest and gave off her best smug vibes. "Heck yeah you can! We got this!" Jura was quiet, but his sister assumed he was in agreement.

For about a millisecond, Drake smiled very shyly, then returned to his normal freaked out appearance. "Oh! That's, um… Y-yeah. That's great. Th-thanks…" He seemed a bit mentally disoriented after having a minor break from his almost constant state of anxiousness, and had to backtrack to his previous train of thought. "O-oh… Y-yeah, the, uh, Speed Fiends were around th-the back of Yodel Hills." Fingers started tapping together yet again. "I'm… counting on you."

* * *

**Heyyy, so I decided last week after I got home that I really would enjoy a weekend off from writing, so I did. Sure, it's a little bit later than the others have been, but hey I updated, so that's gotta count for something. My eyes hurt, my finger coordination is off, but I am updating this flipping thing gosh darn it.  
**

**Anyways, I was a little distracted while I was writing this about every time I sat down to write, so hopefully this turned out all okay. I think the lack of fossil battles threw me off a bit. Everything felt too peaceful or something. XD**

**Also hey, sorry if Nibbles hasn't been as obvious as he should be. It's kind of hard to remember to fit him in since he doesn't talk like normal vivos. I'm trying, but I'll start trying harder. ;-;**


	13. Fiends and Friends(?)

"I really don't think you should come."

"Come oooooon Jura, just say I told you I had permission!"

Gosh, no wonder Violet was so obsessive over Lucky. He literally got kidnapped yesterday and he was already trying to get them to take him along to deal with a _gang_. When he'd said he felt invincible, Jura hadn't thought it would include something to this extent.

Tria gave him a nudge, like she normally would right before she gave him advice or something. "C'mon, Jura, just let him come along. His Ajka kicks butt." She poked at his arm for emphasis, earning a glower in reply.

"What if something bad happens? How are we gonna explain that to Violet?"

And as per usual, she was giving him her best 'gosh you're paranoid' look. "The Speed Fiends are just speeding, gosh, they're not gonna randomly kidnap someone." Well, she did have a point. Kidnapping would probably be counterproductive to their goal. Jura sighed and looked down to Lucky, whose eyes were bright and excited.

"Fine."

The small psychic cheered, giving Jura a hug. "Awesome! Let's go kick some butt!" he added as he released the taller redhead. At least his enthusiasm was nice to have around. It sort of took away Jura's concern of getting caught bringing him along to deal with a _gang_.

Then suddenly there was the overwhelming feeling that someone was behind him, and gosh Jura was really hoping it wasn't Violet. And yet, he was way too afraid to check. Sure, Lucky wasn't flipping out or anything, but still, it could be her.

"What's up, rookie?"

Oh gosh it was worse than Violet.

Barely managing not to make some sort of startled noise, Jura staggered forward and stopped next to Tria. Sure enough, there was Leon, looking cocky as always. When Tria had said she got dibs on the Paleo Pal they'd bring along, he had not even thought of Leon. Sure, their differences were supposed to be aside now, but he was still tall and still very intimidating to Jura, and he would just assume not cross paths with him if at all possible.

Tria, on the other hand, was pretty comfortable with him. Then again, who wasn't Tria comfortable with? "Hey, Leon, you been able to not get yelled at since we left?" the blunette smirked, arms crossing as she stared up at the much taller teen.

Leon, as expected, rolled his eyes, but in a friendly sort of way. "I don't need you two around to stay out of trouble," he chuckled. His gaze came to rest on Lucky and he grinned. "Hey, short stuff, how's it been?"

"Pretty good! Especially since I got to go out and dig fossil _without_ getting kidnapped." Oh wow, Lucky sounded spiteful. His happy tone really emphasized the point. And made him sound creepy. Super creepy.

However, Leon seemed to appreciate the comment for whatever reason. "Yeah yeah, I get it. Sorry 'bout that, by the way." Somehow, the eldest teen managed to sound cocky _and_ apologetic simultaneously. That took some skill.

Lucky broke out in a fit of giggles. "It's fine! I'm super over it now!" the small redhead beamed, hands going to his hips. "If I _was_ still mad my parents would kill you! Literally!" He started laughing again, and oh boy this kid was good at being creepy.

"Alright, enough with the vague threats, let's go, uh, stop a gang," Jura interrupted awkwardly, getting a disappointed look from Tria. She enjoyed confrontation too much. He tried to shrug it off, nodding sternly to Lucky and Leon. They seemed alright with the plan to head out.

* * *

It was like déjà vu heading back into Yodel Hills, and not just because they'd been in there earlier today. A matter of minutes went by and all of a sudden there was ringing and an image popped up on the monitor. Jura almost screamed. Thankfully it wasn't Violet, like he'd been expecting. Well, it was Drake, but he felt like that guy wasn't as scary as her.

"H-hey, um, J-Jura and Tria?" Even through a monitor he couldn't keep eye contact with them. "I have some new… i-info for you. About the S-Speed Fiends. Th-they're, um, led by someone called Big Mama…?"

And here came the ever so appreciated commentary from Tria. "The heck kinda name is Big Mama?" Almost instantly she broke out in laughter, and Jura was certain it wasn't over anything good. "Sounds like one of those weird names those super weird couples give each other."

Yep. He was right. That was definitely something he could have lived his life without hearing.

"Well, uh, thanks for that, Drake," Jura replied hastily, trying his best to cut off his sister's topic. The blond viking nodded slowly, rocking nervously in whatever he was sitting on.

"N-no problem… Oh, and, um, good l-luck…" Drake waved shyly, the corners of his mouth barely twitching into what could be considered a smile. Then he was hanging up rapidly, probably relieved to be free of social interaction. It must really stink being an incredibly introverted branch leader. Dealing with people's problems had to be a nightmare.

But enough about that. They'd managed to sneak Lucky out successfully, so things were looking good so far. Finding the Speed Fiends was next on the agenda. Hopefully that would go just as well.

A short, stress-filled drive ensued, with Tria purposefully swerving around vivosaurs and hitting jumps and just being an all-around pain in the butt. Jura found himself clinging desperately to Nibbles, who seemed just as worried as he was. It sure was nice having a kindred spirit around.

In Tria's defense, not that he was approving of her reckless driving, they did get to the back of the dig site unscathed. It was just as uneventful as he remembered, aside from the occasional rogue vivosaur. They drove a bit further in, and all of a sudden things picked up.

Three huge Bone Buggies, the likes of which were too bulky to do much more than carry stuff, were basically doing really fast and bad donuts. Since they were so big, it was hard to just do a normal spin, so they were just doing laps and kicking up a lot of dust. And blaring their horns. For some reason, all Jura could think of was Tria.

She was thinking the same thing. "Hey, that looks super fun!" A pause, and she hung her head slightly, obviously disappointed. "I mean, uh, we better stop them."

Horn blaring got louder, and the three bulky vehicles came to a dusty halt in front of their burgundy one. Jura almost screamed again. He managed to prevent it by repeatedly telling himself that no, they hadn't got rammed, calm the heck down.

"Looks like we got a Warden on our tail!" one of the Speed Fiends yelled tauntingly over the radio. He sounded cocky enough, but the plan fell out when one of his teammate's could be heard yelling, "Crud! How did the law get here so fast?!" in the background of the former's call.

This was kind of like a repeat of what happened with Lucky's kidnappers. They seemed tough until all of a sudden someone was cracking down on them. Not that Jura had a problem with that. Their lack of backbone made his life much less stressful.

The original speaker resumed, his voice losing a bit of confidence after the remark. "Anyways, you Wardens better get your nose outta this and putter on outta here!" This time confident cheers backed him up. Great. Time to feel nervous.

Of course, Tria was more than willing to defy anyone, and a gang member was no exception. "Forget it! We're gonna kick your butts until you cry!" As tempting as it was to get after Tria for her lack of Warden-esque language, now was probably not the time to call her out on proper etiquette. Maybe later at a less life-threatening time.

"Y-you're kiddin' me!" Holy cow, Tria's threats were actually effective. "You really wanna throw down with the likes of us?!"

"Darn right, you wusses!"

The radio cut out and the Speed Fiends' tires ripped up the dirt. They backed up, kicking plenty of dust into the air. Looked like they were gonna settle this with a Fossil Battle. Figures.

Tria nudged him all of a sudden, to which Jura flinched due to the tension he was feeling. "Yo, you wanna take this one, bro? I dealt with the last criminals."

"Alright, I guess…"

Who to use, who to use… Well, Nibbles seemed like as good a choice as any. Rolling down the window, Jura gave his red vivosaur a pat on the back to signal him to hop out. With an excited growl, the biped leaped through the window and charged on to the battlefield, body flashing up and up into his larger, fiercer form.

Morgan trotted out from Lucky's Buggy, shooting a glance over to Nibbles. She didn't seem all that surprised by him. Maybe she'd heard of him before from Drake or Violet. It was still kind of weird though.

The bangs of Dino Gears being launched filled the air, interrupted Jura's random thought train. The remaining four vivosaurs materialized on the field. Scout in all his yellow furred glory flitted at the front of their team, whereas the Speed Fiends gained three blue vivosaurs to their side.

At the front of their side was a Thalasso that was quite a bit bigger than Shrike. Following it up was a frail, light blue biped around six feet long with yellow markings and a row of green feathers atop its head. A Hypsi US, obviously, since it looked identical to Penny's Hypsi but with different colors.

However, their last vivosaur sent shivers up Jura's spine, and for good reason. The biped, around twenty feet long and eight feet tall, had a rather unique build that he could only identify to a Cryo, and the ice frozen to its body attested to that. Two large, spears of ice pronged from its head, and its feet looked as though they had been chipped free from a prison of ice. Spires of the frozen spikes shot down its back. Its eyes were really what were creeping out Jura, though. Pure blue. No pupils. Completely soulless. Ugh.

With a shriek from Leon's Ptera, the battle officially began. Wings flapping powerfully, Scout shot at the Hypsi US, his beak spearing directly into the biped's side and toppling it over like a bowling pin. But, unlike a bowling pin, the blue creature struggled back up to its feet. How it was still standing was beyond Jura, but it was injured severely and probably would go down after the next hit it took.

In a similar fashion to Scout, the Thalasso rocketed towards Nibbles, scraping up his side. Unlike the Hypsi US, Nibbles took the hit fairly well and remained standing. In fact, as the pterosaur fluttered away he made a few chomps after it. Not that any of them actually hit, but it was the thought that counted.

Morgan ducked underneath the retreating Thalasso and leaped at the unsuspecting Hypsi. She slammed her head down _hard_, making the small biped recoil with a pitiful cry as it clutched its skull. As it collapsed, light enveloped it and it was back to a small blue gear. That one had gone down rather fast, so hey, maybe the other two would as well.

The monitor flashed up a list of Nibbles' attacks, which Jura began to skim through. He didn't use Nibbles all that often out of concern of injury, so he still had to check them out. But really, set up wise, he already had an idea of what he wanted to do. Popping his head out the window, the redhead shouted out to his partner, "Saurus Snap on the Thalasso!"

With a grin, because that son of a gun had attacked him in the first place, Nibbles crouched down, chin almost touching the ground, and pushed as hard as his legs would allow. His flying leap sent him soaring towards the Thalasso, which was surprised when jaws clamped on to its back and flattened it to the ground. Almost cackling in a growl-y sort of way, Nibbles trotted off to his position, head held high.

Wait, crap, Nibbles _also_ wasn't paying attention. The Cryo jogged up to him, planting a foot directly on the red vivosaur's side. Ice spread from the contact site and wrapped around Nibbles' back, arm, and upper thigh. Being a Fire element vivosaur, the ice was probably painful as heck, and also having it around his vital organs was definitely detrimental to his health. His pained hissing was a good indicator of that.

While Nibbles was wrapped up in the midst of snarling and struggling to move, Scout maneuvered over him and dive-bombed the grounded Thalasso. It writhed around briefly, unsure of how to handle taking an attack while not in the air. Eventually it gave in to low health and slowed its movement, slumping over and flashing to another blue gear.

The only remaining vivosaur was the Cryo. Judging by the way Morgan was winding up, she was looking to take care of that. Her thick, clawed toes dug into the ground as she charged the frigid reptile. Jura started spamming his Attack Ups for good measure. However, when the Ajka slammed her head into the Cryo's chest, it slid back a ways but remained standing. Crap.

Jura shot another apprehensive glance towards Nibbles, who was still struggling to move. The ice looked like it had spread more. He directed his attention back to the battle only to see that the Cryo had started an attack that he was too late to prepare his vivosaur for with LP Recovery.

Head swirling around, the Cryo exhaled a loud, frosty breath. Water vapor in the air froze and dropped to the ground in little droplets. The cloud of white shot forward at a tremendous speed, encapsulating Nibbles for the most part, but portions darted off path and caught Scout and Morgan as well.

The cold was too much for the already freezing vivosaur, and with a sad cry he flashed down to his smaller form. The ice that had been stuck to him fell to the ground and shattered into a million pieces. Nibbles definitely looked disappointed. Crestfallen, even. Jura leaned out of the Buggy a little further, shyly yelling to the bandana clad creature, "Hey, you did great! That was my fault! I wasn't paying very close attention…"

He seemed to perk up at that comment, so Jura smiled and leaned back into his seat. Leon and Lucky had to finish up the battle now. Scout's wing membranes had frosted over, and each of his flaps were labored. Morgan's crest had taken the brunt of the ice, but crystals had formed up her neck and debilitated her just a bit. But, with such low health, the Cryo still didn't stand much of a chance.

Wing beats filled the air as Scout put the last of his energy into his final attack. He gained altitude rapidly, finishing his ascent off with one final burst of wind. The gust blasted the Cryo, sweeping it off its feet and back to the ground in one smooth motion. With a flash, it was back to its gear.

Trills and high-pitched roars from Scout and Morgan respectively reverberated as the two returned to their Fighters' Bone Buggies. Nibbles came trotting back over to Jura's side of the vehicle, hopping in once he'd popped the door open. Well, the battle hadn't been a complete failure. Nibbles went up to Rank 11, so that was cool.

The radio flicked back on. Whether it was accidental or not, all they could hear for a few moments was the Speed Fiends talking amongst themselves in a panicked manner. Finally one of them seemed to gather up the courage to chew them out.

"Better not let this go to your head, Warden!"

Jura sighed, patting Nibbles on the head while I thought of snarky comments that he would never dream of saying. "_Really wasn't planning on it. My vivo got knocked out because I was worried about it, so…"_

"When Big Mama finds out what happened, she's gonna turn you into a 15-car pileup!"

"Yeah!" another one chimed in, quickly losing confidence as he went, "And then she'll take you to the junkyard and… uh… strip out your transmission!"

Then, laughing and cheering, the trio slammed on the gas and shot by them. They seemed awfully cocky for lackeys that just got the crap beat out of them. Whoever Big Mama was, she was definitely threatening.

"Man, that name gets weirder the more I hear it," Tria snorted, almost as if she had read Jura's thoughts. "If I hear someone say 'Big Mama' one more time, I'm gonna threaten kinkshaming."

And there was another thing to add into his long list of things he could have lived without hearing from Tria. Not that he was gonna call her out on it. She'd just spew out more stuff out of spite. Plus she was starting to drive them back to the park, so that would capture her attention for a while.

* * *

Dealing with the entire Speed Fiends ordeal had taken about an hour (that included driving and such), so as soon as they got back Lucky had to bounce. He said he had to be back in time for supper so his parents didn't know what he was up to, which kind of made sense. Though Jura was starting to become doubtful of a few things because first off, if Violet was psychic how the heck did Lucky get around that, and second, even if she wasn't, how would he explain being gone the exact time they were off taking care of the Speed Fiends.

Whatever, that was Lucky's life. So long as they didn't get in trouble, Jura decided not to care so much. All he really had to worry about was checking back in at the leader's office and letting Drake and Violet know they'd taken care of the Speed Fiends.

Wait, no, they'd be eating with Lucky, hence why he'd ran off. That meant they had time to kill. There wasn't exactly a ton to do, what with Tria's procrastination earlier in the day. And they couldn't hang out with Leon, thankfully, because he'd gone back to America for lunch. So then it was free time...? Maybe when Tria got out of the garage after who knows how long she'd have an idea.

It took another ten minutes or so, but his sister finally made it out. Upon reaching Jura, she shoved three discs in his face: one green, one blue, one red. He grabbed them, of course, and looked them over, shocked to find that they were Racer, Shrike, and Ja-

"_JURA! HEY JURA! CAN YOU HEAR ME OR ARE YOU DEAF AGAIN?"_

Oh gosh no.

The redhead sent a painfully questioning look to his twin. "Why are you giving me my gears?" She seemed pretty smug, and that was never a good sign.

"Well, I figured that we can get closer to our vivos if we do this! I mean, Lucky walks around with his Ajka, and they're really close, so this'll help us with ours!" Tria explained, hands on her hips in the manner she does it in when she knows she's right. And for once, she _was_ right. It couldn't hurt to get closer to the creatures they make fight everything.

"_JURA YOU DIDN'T ANSWER, DOES THAT MEAN YOU'RE DEAF?!"_ Jack shrieked, making his fighter cringe. He was pretty sure part of Tria's bonding experiment involved seeing his reactions to Jack.

But, for the sake of his own mental health, Jura did have to answer the loud Alxas. "_No, Jack, I can hear you, I was just busy,"_ he replied as sincerely as he could. Another surge of energy and screaming was bubbling up from what he could only identify as Jack's presence in the back of his mind, but it was put out by a cool wave of excitement.

"_AAHHH! Ohmygoshohmygosh! We get to hang out and spend time together and eat food together and meet new people together and thisisallsupersuperexciting!" _

The unmistakable, trilling voice of Shrike was a fresh of breath air to Jura's throbbing head. Sure, she was loud and vaguely obnoxious, but at least her voice was pleasant to listen to. Jack's was kind of like nails on a chalk board. Or maybe more like a slightly off-tune instrument. It was close to the right sound, but just enough off to make everything he said sound wrong.

The last, only calm voice that Jura had been waiting for finally spoke up. "_C'mon, guys, don't blow up his brains too much... He's not used to all of us talking to him constantly."_ At least Racer cared about his well being.

"_SORRY, JURA. WE'LL BE QUIETER NOW." _That sounded promising. Especially the way he screamed it. Jack saying he'd be quiet was like Sean saying he'd remember something.

"Hey, so what do you wanna do now?"

It took Jura a few seconds to realize that Tria had asked him that and not one of his vivosaurs. This was going to take a while to get used to.

He turned towards his sister, shrugging and looking defeated. "I dunno. Wanna just head back to our rooms? We've gotta go to bed soon anyways, and we can probably check in about the Speed Fiends in the morning."

She did those finger gun things and winked. "Sounds like a plan!"

The rooms in Europe weren't at the base like they were in Asia and America. And they weren't rooms as much as they were apartments. They were located behind the closed Fossil Mart - there was a path between it and the Warden base that lead to them. Wardens got to stay in them for free, but they were rented out to random people who wanted to stay in the Park. Extra revenue for random things.

Jura and Tria had barely taken two steps down the trail when three men, each clad in some weird pink and purple uniform, jumped out in front of them. It was too late in the day to stop it anymore. Jura screamed. And it wasn't in an okay, older teen way. It was in a squeaky, crackling shriek that reminded him that his voice still needed to straighten out from puberty.

Of course Tria had started laughing. "Alright, alright, sorry, what do you guys want?" She was completely unphased about getting jumped by three guys that could easily kidnap them. At least Nibbles was growling at them.

"_DON'T WORRY, JURA, I'LL BEAT 'EM UP FOR YOU."_

Oh yeah. They had their vivosaurs on them. "_Thanks, Jack, but I think I think Nibbles can handle that."_

"Bet you thought you could get away, huh?" the middle one belted out, looking kind of confused himself. Tria's reactions to just about everything confused everyone. Except Jura, but that was mainly because he was used to them.

But, neither of them were really sure what that guy was talking about, so equally blank looks came in reply. The one to the first guys' left pointed at them accusingly, trying to sound harsh. "Don't play dumb with us! We're way better at it then you are!"

"_What."_

It was back to the middle one now. "We're the Speed Fiends you left in the dust back there!" That explained why the sounded so confident and unconfident at the same time.

"You got lucky last time, but that's about to change!" the one on the right announced, smirking. Jura's gaze went straight to Tria. She had a sort of frustrated scowl going on.

"We kicked your butts, man! And if you're gonna kidnap us or something, I _will_ sack a Titano on you!" she threatened, pulling out Morton's white gear for emphasis. That would be kind of brutal, actually. Morton could kill one of them with a step quite easily.

The right one was laughing kind of pathetically at her threat. "No, we brought you a special friend to show you the true meaning of pain!" The all joined in with the laughing now, and at that point Jura was starting to not be all that scared of them. They just laughed and bluffed.

But, the Speed Fiends all turned towards the back of the building, grinning wide. The middle one yelled, "All yours, Big Mama!" and holy smokes Jura felt his heart skip a beat. They actually went through on a threat, no way.

Tria snorted, not in the least bit intimidated. "Yo, Big Mama, I think I'm gonna have to kinkshame you." Why was she going through with that? _Why?_ It was just gonna get them in deeper trouble.

"Why? Have my good-for-nothing lackeys been talkin' me up again?" someone definitely closer to their age than Jura had expected replied. She also sounded familiar. Kind of like Tria, actuall- Oh no.

Sure enough, stepping around that corner was the slightly-darker-shade-of-redhead, Dahlia, who basically stopped at stared at the twins for a few seconds, as did they. Awkward silence settled between them before Dahlia took a step back, gasping out, "Tria? The heck are you doing here?"

"Hey! Dahlia!" Tria grinned, closing the distance between the two of them. Jura thought they were going to hug or something, but no, they just high-fived.

The checkered clad girl beamed, equally happy to see her friend. "Holy snaps! I haven't seen you in forever! Heard you're workin' for the Captain these days."

"So am I!" Jura butted in, trying to worm his way back into the conversation. They were ignoring him, though. Great.

"Yeah, we get to go all over the place!" his sister answered. At least she said 'we' and not 'I'. "Just got here today from America, actually."

"Oh yeah? Is Leon gettin' his butt whooped into shape?"

"Yeah. Pretty sure he's got a thing for the leader's sis. She's got him whipped now."

"_Guys_, am I right?"

They both broke out laughing, and suddenly Jura was getting the idea that the Speed Fiends were feeling about as left out as he was. And probably confused. Sure, he and Tria knew Dahlia, but those three sure as heck didn't know him and Tria.

The middle one, who seemed to do most of the talking, walked up to his 'boss' and tapped her on the shoulder. "Big Mama, you know these two?" The gearhead nodded eagerly in reply, throwing an arm around Tria's shoulders.

"Sure I do! Ol' Tria here-" she stopped to make a vague gesture over to Jura "and her bro, Jura, graduated from the same class a' Wardens I did."

He was taken aback by her statement. "B-Big Mama? _You're_ a Warden?!"

"Er, did I not mention that?" She started laughing again after a few seconds. Dahlia really wasn't making the connection that everyone else was making. Well, maybe not Tria, but still. "I work here at the European branch."

"Hold on, hold on." Gosh he couldn't take this anymore. Jura strode up to the two girls, trying his best to look like he was worth listening to. "How have you _not _got in trouble with Violet yet?"

Dahlia just shrugged. "I dunno. She's super busy all the time? Yeah, let's go with that."

Well, that sort of made sense. Maybe. Jura didn't feel like pushing his luck, because frankly she was starting to look more serious now and her high energy levels made him uncomfortable.

The darker redhead leaned back on her heels, hands resting on her hips. "Look, lemme just cut to the chase, all right?" Oh boy, she _was_ getting serious. "My racin' buddies here say you threw 'em down. What's up with that?"

"We got orders to shut the Speed Fiends down," Jura replied confidently. She couldn't get mad at him if she knew he had orders, right?"

"They're crackin' down on us?" Dahlia blinked, definitely stunned. Then her face crinkled up with frustration, and Jura felt himself step closer to his sister. "I gotta say, that's _completely_ unfair! It's not like we hurt anyone! We just drive wherever we want as fast as we want. Nothing wrong with that."

"Dang that sounds fun. Can I join your gang?" Tria asked hopefully, eyes bright with anticipation. She really wasn't Warden material, was she? Then again, Dahlia was almost exactly the same way and she made it through the tests and stuff without a twin.

But, he figured it was better to keep his sister under control for, at the very least, his own sanity. He pulled her back from Dahlia just enough to get her attention. "No one's joining a gang. Dahlia's supposed to _disband_ hers because they're _breaking laws_."

"Laws are for chumps!" said gang leader exclaimed, suddenly sounding rather defensive. Her argument was more immature than Jura was expecting. It made his job as the reasonable friend a lot easier.

"Look, you guys scare the crap out of people and it's rude. So I guess break up or we'll turn you in."

"He'll turn you in, I won't," Tria added in with a grin, pushing her sibling away with ease. He was getting really frustrated with her fast.

Dahlia looked over to him in a cocky manner, a thumb aimed at the blunette. "C'mon, man, even your sis isn't backin' you up. Everyone's got the need for speed. 'Cept you, apparently. Stop being such a stick in the mud!"

"Come on, Dahlia, I'm serious! What do I have to do to make you stop with this stupid gang?" Jura half-whined. As much as he disliked her, especially since she was calling him a stick in the mud, it would really stink if she had to stop being a Warden. She worked pretty hard to get there, unlike another short, hot-headed girl he knew.

Now she was definitely looking smug. Crossing her arms and sort of puffing her chest out, Dahlia stared right up at him defiantly. "Beat me in a Time Attack, you _turtle_. Step up or stand down! I won't take orders from a wuss!"

The Speed Fiends broke out in cheers like the minions they were, and Tria broke out in cackles like the supportive sister she was. This had to be a nightmare. There was no way in heck Jura could beat her in a Time Attack. He could barely drive a Bone Buggy at a slow speed, let alone a fast one.

But, he couldn't argue with her. All he could muster was a simple, "Y-you're on." before his entire brain turned into a giant ball of anxiety and oh gosh it was just bad. He couldn't think _at all_.

Not even Jack's screaming could snap him out of this one.

* * *

**Okay, I'm gonna say sorry this took so long because I actually could have had this up Thursday night if I'd tried. But I didn't. I've been marathoning Parks and Recreation for literally four days straight. I'm at the beginning of season 5. It's kind of pathetic, actually.  
**

**Anyways, because of how long I make these chapters for the sake of updating, I might break the normal pattern of Jura then Tria focus just a little, maybe split it in half for the next chapter for sort of obvious reasons. Guess we'll see how it goes. I'll aim for maybe a faster update, but we'll have to see how busy I am. And motivated. If I lack motivation nothing will get done.**


	14. Gangs and Vomit

"Nibbles, we are _screwed_."

Jura sat in his Bone Buggy in complete silence. He'd put his other vivosaurs away to eliminate stress, because driving was hard enough as it was. Jack screaming in his ears was just unnecessary.

Nibbles sat beside him in the passenger seat, where Tria should have been. Traitor. Why'd she have to be such a butthead about helping him with Dahlia? It was their assignment, after all, and she knew he was a huge wimp about driving.

With a sigh, the redhead flopped back in his seat, eyes locked on the door in front of him. A combination of frustration and stress was making it hard for him to do much of anything else. A small, clawed hand rested on his knee, and his green eyes darted to the small vivosaur beside him.

His equally green reptilian eyes stared up at Jura, an encouraging sparkle in them. A trilling purr rumbled from Nibbles' throat as he rested his maw atop the teen's leg. Smiling just a bit, Jura slowly pet his partner on the head. It was nice to know his vivosaur was still looking out for him.

They stayed like that for another ten minutes or so until Jura had winded down enough to where the tightness in his chest had loosened up and the cold fingers of dread had let go of his body. His thoughts were still panicked, but at least they were more rational. A sort of calm feeling permeated into him.

Picking up on this, Nibbles climbed up into his fighter's lap and laid down there. That was definitely helping lift his spirits. Taking a long, deep breath, Jura exhaled the majority of his remaining anxiety away.

"Alright, I think I'm ready now," the redhead grinned weakly, giving Nibbles one last stroke. The small vivosaur returned to his seat, letting out enthusiastic growls for encouragement. Jura shot him a grateful look. "Thanks, Nibbles. You've always got my back."

With shaky hands, Jura started up the Buggy.

* * *

Jura pulled up next to what could only be Dahlia's Bone Buggy. It looked just like a race car. A red and white race car with digging tools on the back. Who knew there was a model like that?

Almost instantly the darker redhead popped up on his screen, a cocky smirk on her face. "There you are! Thought you chickened out 'n weren't gonna show!" She started laughing and, of course, Jura was starting to get nervous again. Nibbles gave him a comforting trill to help combat it.

"W-whatever, Dahlia, let's just get this over with," he stammered back, trying to sound as indifferent as possible. He was getting the feeling that his efforts were in vain.

"Right, right." She shot him finger guns and leaned back in her seat. "Tria's timin' us. Ready to get your but kicked?" Flicking her sunglasses down over her eyes, Dahlia reached forward and hung up, her engine roaring to life seconds later. Which Jura jumped at. Wheels screeched against pavement, yet another thing he cringed at, and her Buggy shot off like a rocket.

A couple of minutes had barely passed when his radio flicked on again. "Alright, you're up, chump!" Dahlia's laughter filled the car briefly before she hung up.

Taking a deep breath, Jura grabbed the steering wheel with excessive force, body starting to shake. He looked over to Nibbles for support once more, who attempted to give him a thumbs up despite only having two claws and no thumb. The gesture was still appreciated. Then, gulping down a scream, he slammed his foot down on the gas for the first time in his life.

The Bone Buggy lurched forward, knocking both him and Nibbles against the backs of their seats. Jura could already feel the adrenaline setting in and holy smokes was it making it hard to focus. Every little twitch of the steering wheel made them move too much for his comfort, and he kept wondering what would happen if a rogue randomly jumped out.

The first stretch of road was sort of okay. It was straight, and Jura greatly appreciated it before everything changed to _complete and utter hell_. There were so many twists and turns and it was stressful as heck and he was making a shrieking sound that could probably be mistaken for a dying animal.

Finally, after what felt like an eternity of damnation, Jura caught sight of Dahlia's Buggy. He fought the urge to close his eyes and just drive straight, since the road had finally done just that, but he cared more about his safety than his ability to be calm. It wasn't even a matter of beating Dahlia at that point; he just wanted to be on the unmoving ground.

Just a bit further… Almost there…

* * *

Breaks shrieked and dust went everywhere. Tria clicked down on her stopwatch, waiting for Jura's Buggy to come to a halt before checking it. She was shocked that he'd even made it there in one piece. Well, time to check that darn thing and see how bad he got whooped.

Holy crap.

Jura came stumbling out of his vehicle a couple seconds later, completely pale from head to toe and shaking like a chihuahua. His sister ran up to him, but not out of concern. She grabbed his shoulders and shook him a few times.

"Bro! You won! You're the fastest!"

Dahlia's shocked banshee scream filled the air. "WHAT THE HECK, MAN?! I LOST?!"

The dazed and terrified redhead stared at her blankly for a minute, then made a dash to the bushes and proceeded to throw up. Nibbles ran up next to him and sat there, patting him on the back with one of his tiny hands. Tria really didn't know what to do to help, but hey, a lot of great athletes puked after doing a bunch of cool stuff, so clearly he was doing something right.

"_Tria, I'm kinda thinking you shouldn't just watch…" _Maisy murmured, her soft voice strongly contrasting the vast array of sounds around them.

The blunette snorted. "_C'mon, the heck can I do about this?"_

"_Not laugh at him. That's a good flipping start,"_ Morton added in with a heavy sigh, his deep, lumbering voice complimenting Maisy's. They were like some kind of therapist tag-team; it was horrible.

"_I wasn't laughing!"_

"_But you were thinking about it."_ Gosh, why did he insist on being the bigger person about everything? Sure, he _was_ bigger than everyone, but that didn't mean he had to take on that role metaphorically or whatever.

The tongue lashing from her vivosaurs didn't last too long, though, because Jura stopped, which those athletes did as well at some point, and Tria half-dragged him back into the Buggy and drove him back. The only upside to the situation was that he was quiet the whole way back. And also really worn out. It _was_ getting closer to when they should go to bed, so hey, that worked out well.

She ended up leaving him in their vehicle for the sake of not wanting to carry him. And Morton was chewing her up one side and down the other about being considerate.

"_How would you like it if you felt like crap and someone started hauling _you _all over the place?" _he'd said in that stupidly responsible voice of his. It was like having a tougher version of Jura trapped in her head, gall.

But hey, that meant unrestricted time to talk with Dahlia, so that was cool. Her friend was back with her lackies, and it was still really impressive that she had them. Like, she was a year-ish younger than her and Jura, but she still bossed around full-grown men. It was awesome.

"I think my gears got stripped!" Dahlia laughed, her frustration from not much earlier basically gone. "You're bro's better at drivin' than I thought."

Tria grinned the best she could. "He's better at it than _I_ thought. I expected him to barf at the end, but gosh, he almost has a heart attack every time I drive fast. Not sure how the heck he managed to do it." She ended it off with a half-scowl.

"Well, I don't really care how he pulled it off, but he did. I said I'd stop burnin' rubber, and I will." The gearhead looked surprisingly calm about giving up something she was passionate about. Her lackies, on the other hand…

"No, Big Mama!" one of them whined, grabbing her shoulders and shaking her around. "What'll we do without you?!"

Dahlia groaned and spun around, a harsh look on her face. "Get jobs or somethin'. Just don't go spinnin' your wheels again, 'cause I'll run you off the road 'n then some!" The Speed Fiends looked concerned to say the least. They were super pathetic, it was official. Well, it might have been official before, but still.

They looked between each other, then darted off behind the Fossil Mart. Tria was just about to make a very witty remark about it, but then those losers had to come running back out whimpering and whining. Suddenly Jura wasn't seeming so bad.

"We're nothing without you, Big Mama! Please don't leave us!" the 'leader' of their trio blubbered, drawing a sour look from Dahlia.

"Gosh you're such huge wimps!" she remarked sharply, rolling her eyes. After a second of thought, she looked a bit more sympathetic. But mostly smug. "Alright, if you wanna keep me around that badly, you'll have to beat me first!"

The Speed Fiends suddenly looked hopeful. "How about a Fossil Battle, then?"

"Okay… Why?" Dahlia asked, raising a brow.

They all broke out laughing, which was a pretty good indicator that they were up to something bad. "Big Mama may be faster than lightning, but her battle skills are more like molasses!"

"We'll never beat her in a race, but we might stand a chance in a fight!"

"WHAT?!" Oh yeah, she was ticked. "How dare you?! I could kick your butts without even usin' a vivosaur, not that I'm gonna do that! Besides, Tria's got my back!"

"Darn right I do!" Tria added in confidently. Finally, an excuse to do something with Dahlia that Jura couldn't protest about.

The three purple clad men chuckled in that cocky manner they'd adopted for some reason. "I'd say that wasn't fair, but there _are_ three of us, so you're on! Except, for this battle, we're gonna be the Killer Fiends!"

In almost perfect unison, they pulled their purple garment off, revealing black and red ones beneath them. Sure, they were a little better color-wise, but it was still really lame that they all had matching outfits. Seriously, who the heck did that?

"We'll bring our best vivosaurs!" one of the side guys cheered.

Dahlia still looked pretty disgusted. Her hands curled into fists as she sent a sharp, amber glare up at her lackies. "Okay, seriously? Killer Fiends? That's the dumbest name I've ever heard. But whatever, first thing tomorrow we're settling this in the Fossil Stadium!"

"Now you're talking!" the middle one grinned. Laughing like the complete morons they were, the Spee-, sorry, _Killer_ Fiends ran off to who knows where. Maybe they had a super dorky clubhouse to go with their matching outfits. Tria liked how stupid that seemed.

A few moments passed before Dahlia whirled around to look at Tria. "Hey, thanks for helping me out, Tria," she beamed, giving the blunette a pat on the back. "We're gonna kick their butts tomorrow!"

"No prob, man," Tria replied, a big grin on her face. "I'll see you bright n' early so we can go throw down."

"Alright, team! Don't let me down, now!" There was a certain amount of harshness and desperation in Dahlia's last sentence that made Tria think she'd feel really crummy if she didn't show up to support her. Not that she'd bail on her redheaded pal. Never in a gazillion years could she even consider that an option.

They high-fived one last time and broke off for the night.

* * *

The apartments were pretty nice. There was a TV, couch, basic appliances, a couple bedrooms, bathrooms- actually they were _really_ nice. Why the actual heck did Asia's branch have such lame rooms? Like, it was Warden HQ for pete's sake, you'd think they'd have the best of everything. Clearly Europe was winning by a landslide.

With some help from Jack, because no other vivosaurs were near the right size, Tria managed to get her incredibly woozy brother up into their room and into his bed. It was sort of hard because Jack was significantly harder to manage than she thought, but they did it. Jura was passed out from stress and exhaustion, and she had all night to do whatever she felt like. It was gonna be great.

As usual, her first instinct was to get on the Internet. Unfortunately, there were only two available connections, one of which was locked and the other cost money to use. Flipping hotel-type place trying to make money off of everything. But, Tria figured that if she went down to the lobby she could just ask for the password to the locked server, seeing as she was a Warden and all. So, phone in hand, the small blunette headed down to said lobby.

It wasn't a super elaborate lobby; kind of borderline fancy. Just the average chairs and tables and assorted plants that were probably fake. It was surprisingly empty; there wasn't even a receptionist. So much for free wi-fi.

Wait, no, there was someone way in the corner on a laptop. Maybe they knew the password. Seemed like it was worth a shot. Tria strode over to the individual, smiling.

"Hey."

The woman, probably in her mid twenties, vaguely glanced up at her through bespectacled blue eyes. Interestingly, her hair was blue, albeit a significantly lighter shade, like Tria's. Not that they looked alike in any way. She was definitely way taller than Tria and had on much more casual clothes than her. LIke, hoodie and sweatpants casual. Tria may or may not have been minorly jealous.

"What is it?" she murmured in reply, refusing to look up from her laptop. Gosh why did everyone in Europe have British accents. Tria leaned over slightly to see what the older female was doing. She had up one of those boring spreadsheet thingies, ugh. There were way too many numbers.

"You know the wi-fi password?" Tria asked bluntly, waving her phone around for emphasis.

The woman sighed, hand shuffling around in her hoodie's pocket and pulling out a piece of paper. "Give it right back when you're done. I had to encourage unethical behavior to get it, and I'd rather not do it again." She had a sharp look in her eyes that Tria couldn't help but find hilarious.

Taking the scrap of paper, which had scrawled on it in pink pen 'hotpsychic1' (golly gee I wonder who set up the server), Tria went to work typing it in, talking as she went. "So, uh, what kind of unethical behavior?" She looked up hopefully. "I'm Tria, by the way."

Blue eyes flicked back to the laptop. "Sapphire Bling." A pause. "Give me my paper back, love." She didn't even look up, she just held her hand out for it. Tria complied quite willingly, surprising herself slightly. Sapphire snatched it back and returned the slip to its pocket.

"Sooo…" the younger blunette began, rocking back on her heels. She was stopped by a rather loud exhale from her companion of sorts.

"Look, I don't mean to be crass, but I'd appreciate it if you'd leave. I came down here for some peace and quiet away from my blooming sister." The sour look accompanied with the statement was enough to convince Tria to just head back up to her room. Sure she liked to annoy people, but frankly this lady did not seem worth messing with too much. Besides, she had better things to do, like look up vivosaur names so her brother would stop sounding so smart just because he could list off names.

With a rather reluctant, "Yeah, alright," Tria was on her way.

* * *

Morning came faster than expected. Tria had fallen asleep reading through vivosaurs, of course, and had barely made it through half of them. Hopefully that would be enough for a while, though.

Jura was still groggy as heck from the day before, which was fine. She could just come around after the thing with Dahlia and pick him up, that way he wouldn't be tired when they checked in with Drake and Violet about the Speed Fiends. That'd be kinda suspicious. Maybe.

With only a quick utterance of "be back in an hour", Tria shot out the door and hastily made her way to the Fossil Stadium. It was a replica of the Roman Colosseum, which was pretty cool. And sort of morbid, if you thought about it. But Tria wasn't thinking deeply, so it was just really cool.

The lobby in this Stadium was tiled in grey, red, and white, with a staircase in the back covered in luxurious red carpeting. The whole place had sort of a regal air to it, which was awesome. Tria felt like she could kick some serious butt there. Which was exactly what she was planning on doing.

She spotted Dahlia almost immediately, who waved her over. "Hey, Tria! You made it!" She slammed her fist into the palm of her hand. "Those schlubs are all ready to go. Time to go remind who's in charge around here!"

"Gonna have to whip their memory into shape!" Tria replied, to which they high-fived.

Her friend smirked. "You're darn tootin'! Now let's go!"

The Sp- _Killer_ Fiends were already waiting in the stadium, along with Penny, who Dahlia had called up for their third person. Tria didn't really mind, since she figured her equally hotheaded friend probably wanted to catch up with Penny since they'd been Warden Test partners, but she would have appreciated a heads-up. But that was pretty unimportant. What _was_ important was beating these wimps into submission.

There was no preemptive smack talk, which Tria was mildly disappointed about, but she supposed the Fossil Battle would be fun enough to make up for it. The trio's 'best' vivosaurs consisted of a Lophus, Lexo, and Cerato, which were all earth vivosaurs. Wow, she actually recognized them. Heck yes.

The Lophus was surprisingly large in comparison to its teammates. At about 30 feet long and 10 feet tall, it was easily larger than both of them. However, its oddly duck-like appearance and bulky body made it much less intimidating. It was a dusty brown with a gold crest and gold patterns going down its back.

Quadrupedal and covered in blue, crystalline protrusions, the Lexo sat next to it speedwise. Grey and covered with complex white scribblings, the 15-foot creature was about half the size of the Lophus. However, it was nowhere near as derpy looking, and had a certain amount of fierceness Tria had to respect.

Lastly was the middle-sized Cerato, an orange biped with a large head armored in gold. Gold armor lay over its thighs, chest, and back as well. It stood just a bit taller than the Lexo, probably a foot higher than Jura's head, and around five feet longer as well.

Their opponents had clearly outdone them size-wise. Dahlia's Pachy, Camber, was about five feet long and half Jura's height. The green biped, while heavily armored in brown and obviously ready to fight, was pathetically small in comparison to its opponents.

Penny's Hypsi, Alto, wasn't much better off. While she was like a foot longer than Camber, she was definitely shorter. And it didn't help that the little orange biped was just as docile as her fighter.

Suddenly using Maisy was seeming like a worse and worse idea.

The tiny Proto shivered nervously between Alto and Camber, green eyes taking in her significantly larger opponents. Tria was fairly certain they would do alright, but it still seemed like they had a disadvantage of some sort. Maybe she would be proved wrong.

The battle started off with Alto swaying back and forth in song, colorful waves radiating off of her. But they swaying must have screwed her up, because her attack failed to hit any of their giant enemies. Fantastic start.

Next up was a weird attack from the Lophus. It jogged up to Maisy, spinning around and literally sitting on her, squashing the significantly smaller vivosaur to the ground. She squeaked beneath the weight, barely managing to climb up to her feet as her attacker walked away.

Luckily, that duck-faced loser was in a pretty bad stance thanks to that. Tria rolled down her window and shouted, "Spin Drop on that stupid Lophus!" She barely had time to duck back inside and use a couple accuracy ups.

Maisy leaped surprisingly well despite being crushed minutes earlier. She spun around rapidly, slamming into the Lophus' back and forcing it down on all fours. Claws digging into its back, the Proto bounced off and back to her place between her bipedal teammates.

Almost as soon as Maisy's feet had touched the ground, the Lexo was charging Alto. Front feet digging down hard, it flipped onto its back and spun forward like some horrifyingly sharp wheel. Its spines kicked up a large amount of dust, making it hard to see and thus very hard to avoid. Which a sharp cry, spines hit scales and the Hypsi was forced to crouch in order to endure the sharp puncture wounds down its back. Gosh those looked painful.

Circling back around, the Lexo slammed back into the sandy earth, its body pinned to the ground from the force of it. The spiny vivosaur struggled to push itself back up, which was definitely good for them. That meant it was vulnerable for some sort of attack.

Camber rocketed by all of a sudden, making a beeline for the Lophus. The her head was lowered made Tria wonder if she was going for a headbutt, but it quickly turned into a leap. With a powerful swing of her leg, the Pachy bashed the much larger herbivore's head and knocked the vivosaur on its side, reverting it to a yellow gear. One down already. This was gonna be easy.

The Cerato was up next. With a grunt, it ran and leaped at Alto, large feet coming down on her back. Due to the size difference, only one of its feet hit the Hypsi, but it was still a powerful enough kick to slam her to the ground. Head feathers twitching and beak snapping, the tiny vivosaur pushed herself back onto her feet. Then, throwing her head forward, she shrieked.

Chaotic bursts of color shot out from her and, with a tremendous amount of force, spun around the Lexo and Cerato. Unfortunately, in the process, a spiny tail courtesy of the Lexo came around and smacked Alto off her feet, leaving her in a shocked daze. At least Tria had noticed it in time to shoot her some Defense ups.

Luckily, while it was not able to do a ton of damage, the Hypsi's scream had put the Cerato in a bad position. Tria was really happy about that. Hitting a couple of Accuracy ups _before_ she leaned outside in order to prevent missed opportunities, she shouted out to Maisy, "Spin Drop that Cerato! And try to knock it out!"

Nodding nervously, Maisy crouched and jumped, spinning around once more. She slammed crest first into the Cerato, its body popping back into a gear beneath her. With a surprised squeak, she flopped to the ground, unable to recover in time to land on her feet. Tria found herself laughing.

Then Camber was whizzing by again. She was just about as speed crazed as Dahlia, it seemed. The Pachy jumped into the air, dive bombing the Lexo headfirst directly on its back. Her momentum caused her to bounced off afterwards, feet skidding against the ground as she landed.

Once again struggling to get itself off the ground, the Lexo stood little chance against the greatly aggravated Alto. Bounding forwards, the tiny Hypsi gave one great chomp of her beak and latched onto the quadruped's neck, head bobbing up and down as she slammed its head to the ground a few times for extra measure. The third time the Lexo flashed down to its gear, which Alto stomped on once with a snort. Okay, maybe she _wasn't_ as docile as Penny...

* * *

"I can't believe you thought you could beat me!"

Dahlia was borderline laughing hysterically, pointing at the Speed Fiends, who were definitely the Speed Fiends again since they were in their stupid purple clothes, and almost doubled over while doing so. Tria was laughing too, but gosh, Dahlia was kind of going overboard.

It took her a solid five minutes to calm down enough to finish talking. "I don't wanna hear any more lip from you guys _ever_! Go get jobs or something! You got it?!" the redhead exclaimed, looking stern for a brief moment. One of her lackies muttered a quick "Y-yes ma'am" under his breath, then the three of them were bolting off to who knows where.

Beaming, Dahlia turned back to Tria. "Alright-y, now that that's taken care of, let's go check in with the boss." She paused momentarily, suddenly looking nervous. "We should get our story straight first. Leave out the part about me bein' a gang leader. Seriously."

They ended up getting Jura together for the sake of sorting out what to say. For once he was willing to go along with covering for someone. Hopefully he wouldn't wimp out on them, for his own safety. Dahlia would probably be alright, sure, but Tria would kick his butt if he snitched. Maybe that was why he was cooperating.

Well, whatever reason, they were up in Drake's stupidly cold office, so Jura had better not blow their cover. He was weirdly intimidated by Violet for some reason, and he was taller than her. Height was wasted on him.

"I'm impressed you three took care of the Speed Fiends all by yourselves," Violet beamed, wand tapping against her hand. She was seated on the edge of Drake's desk, legs swinging. "I never saw it coming!"

"Um, yeah…" Drake added in, taking a breath to steady his voice before he continued. "Y-you did… r-really good. I'm happy." He paused, eyes moving to some random corner. "Even if I-I look scared…"

Tria assumed that meant they would get some Warden Points for their troubles. But then again, she wouldn't be surprised in the slightest if they didn't get them until later. Drake probably didn't want to do much more than huddle up into as small of a shape as possible behind his desk while other people were present.

That was supported shortly afterwards when the blond hugged himself a bit harder and attempted to look at the trio of teens. "I-I guess that means I c-can… l-let you into the Challenge Routes in… Y-Yodel Hills…" His gaze dropped to his desk. "I-I hear they're fun from Sean, but… I've never b-been. Don't r-really leave this room m-much…" The whole stammered spiel ended with one exasperated breath, followed by Violet leaning over and giving him a peck on the cheek.

With Drake completely and totally flustered at that point, the small witch seemed to deem it time for just chatting. "Hey, so this is probably just one of those silly rumors that start from time to time, but is it true you kicked Big Mama's sorry arse in a Time Attack, Jura?"

"Uh, actually…" Jura began, pausing upon seeing the threatening look from Dahlia. He swallowed deliberately, looking back to Violet. "Yeah, I did. It was close, though. I bet Dahlia could have done a better job than me."

The gearhead looked satisfied with his answer. Violet was still stuck on rumors, though.

"I hear she has crazy eyes, and a foot made of solid gold!" Oh gosh, was Dahlia's eye twitching? "Oh, and her hands have permanently fused with her bloody steering wheel!" Violet broke out in a fit of giggles, but Dahlia was too concerned with her reputation to notice that she was joking.

With a sharp voice, the redhead turned to Jura. "She's not like that at all! Right, Jura?" His slight chuckling only ticked her off more. "C'mon, tell 'em it wasn't like that! Do it!"

Jura was basically petrified at that point, his fear of physical confrontation taking over. Violet was too busy laughing to really notice, and Tria was trying to decide if she needed to, for once in her life, get Dahlia to calm down. It was sort of chaotic. And yet Drake got himself involved willingly.

"Um, is s-something… wrong?"

Dahlia whipped around towards her boss, to which he cringed, with a panicked grin on her face. "N-no! Nothin's wrong!" She ended in excessively loud tittering that got more awkward the longer she did them. Luckily she picked up on that and just went silent after a moment.

"Um… O-okay. I-I'm just glad that… You know. Y-you guys helped us out…" Drake went back to tapping his fingers together, eyes glued to the movements. That seemed to help him stay calm. "I-if trouble comes here again, maybe, uh, you two, th-that is, J-Jura and Tria could… help us some more?" He vaguely glanced up at the twins. "'Cause otherwise I-I'd have to do it and…" A rather embarrassed look was shared with Violet, who 'replied' with a mildly concerned one. "...Yeah. Th-that probably wouldn't end well…"

"I'm sure you could take 'em, boss!" Dahlia grinned, trying her best to look encouraging. All it really did was embarrass Drake more.

"Th-that's… not what I'm w-worried about…"

* * *

**Just for the sake of getting this up sooner than later, I'm just cutting it here because why not.  
Also all the cameos. Sorry not sorry, I love Saph too much.  
**

**Anyways, hopefully this is okay. My computer was lagging really bad during the battle scene, so any typos can be blamed on that. For some reason, my computer will put the letters down in the wrong order or other weird stuff when it lags. So yeah. Hopefully this is an acceptable chapter that you all enjoy.  
Oh, and quick note, Camber is a racing term. Just thought I'd throw that out there.  
**

**Also, yay! Going back to Asia soon! I love all of these guys but like, Mei Lian. That is all.**


	15. Stories and Rogues

The meeting of sorts didn't last much longer, thankfully. Jura wasn't sure how much more of Dahlia he could withstand. She really needed to chill.

"Holy smokes! I was nervous as an engine with a faulty piston ring in there!" said gearhead exclaimed, looking rather relieved. "Listen, though. You guys gotta promise, and I mean _promise_, never to tell anyone I was Big Mama. Or that I led the Speed Fiends. Or that Jura beat me in a race. Or any of it, actually."

"We won't! Right, Jura?" Tria swore, looking up at her brother sternly. He hadn't been planning on ratting out Dahlia anyways, since she was obviously sorry about the whole ordeal, but that look from her was enough to get rid of any doubts he may have had.

He nodded rapidly. "Of course!"

Dahlia beamed, relaxing completely. "Sweet! And since you're being so cool about covering for me, we can be Paleo Pals!"

"Heck yes!" It was a wonder Tria wasn't foaming at the mouth. She looked so psyched about that. Sure, she and Dahlia were pretty close, but gosh, she didn't have to be so ecstatic about that.

Seeing as how they'd gone through the whole registry thing a few times, getting Dahlia set as an official Paleo Pal didn't take too long. The only reason it took them forever to actually head back to Asia was Tria's unwillingness to stop talking with Dahlia. Luckily, Jura was able to convince her to get moving by reminding her that Nate was over in Asia, and she could hang out with him. That and Dahlia actually had to go do some stuff with some other Warden in Europe.

After they'd finished up with that, the twins went and reluctantly gathered up their stuff from their really nice apartment. That was the only part of going back to Asia that stunk - the lame rooms. Or room, really. They had to go back to sharing a room, ugh. At least they had separate beds.

The trip through the World Gate hadn't been as nauseating as Jura remembered it being, so that was good. With Nibbles closely flanking his legs, so much so that he was concerned he would trip over his partner, Jura led them down to their room. Well, only a few feet, since Nate caught sight of them and immediately hurdled over.

"Oh, hey guys!" Of course, when he said 'guys', he really just meant Tria. At least Nate tried to be polite, even if he failed miserably at it. Wait, no, he was looking straight at Jura. Maybe he did want to talk with both of them. "Has that dumb vivosaur of yours stopped biting people on the butt yet?" Nate asked, casting a worried glance to Nibbles.

Of course, the tiny biped replied with a shrill roar that turned into snarling. It was kind of funny how much he didn't like Nate. And, of course, said teen made some weird squeaking noise in reply. Tria started laughing at him.

Slightly flustered since he'd realized Nibbles didn't do much more than make noise, Nate cast an embarrassed glance to the side, grumbling out, "You know, Stryker may be a hero who saved the world and all, but I still don't get why he made you look after that bitey vivosaur…"

"Wait, Stryker saved the world?"

Eyes went to Tria immediately, both pairs filled with shock. She didn't seem to care that much, though. She just looked clueless. How did she _not_ know that? _How?_

"Wait, wait, wait." Nate put his hands up, blinking a few times from surprise. "You really don't know why Stryker's so famous?"

"Nope." Gall, she didn't even look concerned. This was a huge event in history. What the heck.

Jura was too busy trying to figure out how Tria would have avoided learning that to even think of telling her. At least Nate stepped up for once. "Alright, well, I can tell you. A while back-"

"Five years ago," Jura corrected, earning annoyed looks from his companions. But he just stared back harshly, refusing to be intimidated by their 'peer pressure'. "It's important. Trust me."

"Fine, fine, _five years ago_, there was this scary evil organization planning to take over the world, y'know, like they do, called the BR Brigade."

"That's a stupid name."

Jura rolled his eyes. "Well yeah, that's what villains do. Have lame names."

Nate cleared his throat. "Hey, _I'm_ telling the story here. Anyways, they did a bunch of crappy things, but the worst were their enhanced dark vivosaurs." The pink haired teen paused, lowering his voice slightly. "I heard they took over some of the Fossil Parks with 'em."

"The heck are dark vivosaurs?" Tria asked rather loudly. Her brother thought about it for a moment and suddenly realized he didn't know the answer to that. And, judging by Nate's expression, he didn't either. The term had just been thrown out there on the news. There weren't any pictures, and descriptions- heck, Blackraven had fought Stryker with a normal, every day Giganto.

So, Tria's question was just answered with shrugs. She seemed dissatisfied, but stayed quiet.

"Alright, back on track!" Nate announced, tugging on his goggles. "So INTERFOL, y'know, International Fossil Police, put good ol' Captain Stryker on the case. And, of course, the Captain tracked down their leader, Dr. Baron von Blackraven, to his super awesome submarine lair, and kicked his butt, because Stryker's just that good!"

"There was a parade and everything, Tria," Jura added in sourly, casting a glare to his sister. "We went to it, remember?"

She snorted, smirking just a bit. "Dude, you know all I care about is candy. And they were throwing candy."

"I can see why that would be distracting," Nate grinned, giving the blunette a pat on the back. She stuck her tongue out a Jura. "But yeah, that's why we've got the Wardens now. Protect the Parks and all that jazz." Another pause. "...Wait, how'd you pass all those tests and junk without knowing this?"

Tria broke out in snickers. "I just copied Jura's answers, duh."

Gosh, why did she keep bringing that up? It was horrible. And Nate was laughing about it. Gosh this was embarrassing.

Once the two of them had stopped laughing, which thankfully didn't take too long, Nate smiled and did a sort of half-wave. "Alright, well, I've done enough yapping. You guys've probably got cool stuff to do with Stryker. I gotta go check in with Liu Ren, anyways."

"Alright, see ya', man!" Tria replied, returning the wave. He stepped into the elevator and, after the doors had closed, Jura turned to his sister, glaring.

"Stop telling people you cheated!" he practically hissed in a low voice, grabbing and shaking her arm a bit for emphasis. All he got was a smirk; sometimes he really hated her cockiness.

"Stop being such a drag!" she smirked in reply, walking into the now open and unoccupied elevator. Jura scrambled in after her, unwilling to be left behind.

A bout of silence settled in as Jura found himself too frustrated to talk and Tria stopped caring about the matter almost instantly. At least the elevator ride wasn't too long. They were up to Stryker's office in no time at all.

Prof. Little was up at the Captain's desk perched on the balls of his feet, probably to help him make eye contact with the significantly taller brunet. He had just finished murmuring something to Stryker, to which the Captain responded with shock and disgust.

"I can't believe this is happening…" His dark blue eyes darted off to the side as he contemplated whatever was disturbing him so much. Almost instantly he snapped back to attention and leaned closer to Little. "He actually escaped?!"

Jura felt his heart skip a beat, followed closely by the cold, empty feeling of dread. Who the heck had escaped that had made Stryker that upset? Anything that phased the Captain _had_ to be majorly horrifying.

The professor was nodding profusely now, his fingers strumming on Stryker's desk. "I calculate an 88% chance he will seek revenge on you, Captain."

Yeah, his heart was racing at that statistic. If flipping Professor Little was saying bad things were gonna happen, bad things were probably going to happen. Jura glanced over to his sister, shocked to see how indifferent she appeared. Heck, she look bored out of her mind.

HOW.

The redhead brought his attention back to Stryker as soon as he heard more muttering. "No, no, he knows that revenge is just a luxury. Which makes him dangerous, yes, but it'll keep him out of our hair long enough to get ready. But I suppose that wouldn't stop his top lieutenants…"

Suddenly Stryker's gaze met Jura's, causing the former to flinch. He cleared his throat, tried his best to hide his worried expression, and stated calmly to Little, "Inform the Wardens of the situation at hand. We can finish this later."

Giving a parting nod, the green haired boy strode off to the elevator, an anxious look crossing over his countenance as he passed Nibbles. That definitely didn't help Jura with his paranoia. But Stryker was motioning for him and Tria to come up to him, so he had to suck it up and try to look brave. And it kind of looked like Stryker was trying to do the same. That was probably just wishful thinking, though.

"I've heard back from both Sean and Drake," the Captain began, smiling widely as he looked between the twins. "It sounds like you're doing excellent work out there. I'm proud of you two."

That helped calm him down. Jura felt a happy flutter in his chest that encouraged a small smile to his face. The fluttering stopped momentarily upon hearing the start of the next sentence. "However-"

"_OH GALL WHAT DID HE FIND OUT!?"_

"-I need you to meet another leader here in Warden HQ."

He bit back a sigh of relief.

"Aren't _you _the leader here?" And there went Tria, unwittingly sticking her foot in her mouth.

But Stryker seemed to appreciate the simple confusion, a light chuckle escaping his lips. "Well, I _am_ the leader of the Wardens, but the problem is simply that. I have to be the leader for every branch at once, so someone has to be here to watch over Fossil Park Asia in my absence. You know, like how Sean and Drake run their respective branches."

"It's basic delegation, Tria," Jura added in, his remark making him feel a bit more confident, even if his sister responded by sticking her tongue out at him.

"Anyways, Liu Ren runs the Asian branch. I'm sure you remember him from your Bone Buggy lessons," Stryker continued, smiling as he noticed recognition in their eyes. "He's a floor below us. Go check in with him and see if he needs any help."

Tria's entire demeanor brightened up. "Sure, we can do that!" She turned to Jura, grabbing his arm and yanking him with her to the elevator. "See you later, Captain!"

As the doors slid shut, Jura turned to his sister. "Man, you were really pumped to get out of there." He tried to emphasize his annoyance, but he could never really tell if she was ignoring it or didn't notice it. Either way, all he got was some sort of smirk in reply.

"Well duh! Nate said he was gonna go see Liu Ren, so that means we get to go hang out with him." A smug nod concluded the statement, leaving Jura slightly more frustrated than before.

It seemed wiser to drop the matter for now, seeing as coming out of an elevator arguing always did look bad. He could just add that to the list of things Tria did to tick him off and move on. Sort of. Luckily the doors opened up before Jura could start brooding, which was definitely for the best.

Nate was chatting with Liu Ren in the middle of the room, which looked oddly like Stryker's office. Of course, upon noticing the twins had arrived, Nate immediately ran over to them with bright eyes. It was kind of funny how little he cared about impressions around his 'boss'.

"Hey! Jura and Tria! Stryker finally sent you guys over here!" Nate exclaimed, bouncing from toe to toe. Liu Ren strode up beside him, a smile on his face.

"Good to see you two," he said serenely, arms folded behind his back. Tria didn't even have time to blurt out 'hi' before he started speaking again. "Your timing couldn't be better."

Tria's excitement immediately changed to annoyance. "Fantastic..." she murmured, pouting slightly. Liu Ren chuckled slightly, which was sort of reassuring to Jura.

"Just hold on a moment. We've just received a distress call from a dig site," the Branch leader continued, bringing Tria back to excitement. "Sounds like someone's Bone Buggy broke down."

Tria broke out in snickers. "Man, that's gotta suck."

"Tria, we got our Buggy wrecked by a Gorgo not too long ago," Jura replied dryly, sending her an annoyed look. She just rolled her eyes.

"Yeah, but that sucker beat the crap out of ours. This person's just broke down out of nowhere." She and Nate shared a laugh at the thought, to which Jura just shook his head. Gosh he needed to find some of his more intelligent friends to hang out with.

Shaking away his negative thoughts, Jura cleared his throat in an attempt to refocus the other two teens. "Anyways, are we just supposed to tow the guy's Buggy back? Because none of us know the first thing about vehicle repair."

"Yes, of course. Oh, and the distress call is from Lantern Lake. I'll arrange for you to receive access to it."

Liu Ren then sent them off to take care of the rescue. Jura suggested right before they left that bringing a third person with them was a good idea, which he instantly regretted. Tria just invited Dahlia along right off the bat. He'd had enough of Dahlia already, seeing as having both her and Tria around really drained his energy, so yet another day with both of them seemed daunting. Oh gosh, and Nate was going to be there. Hooray.

As the three much more energetic teens chattered happily in the garage, Jura got into his Bone Buggy and leaned way back into the seat. Nibbles sat in the passenger seat in Tria's absence, seemingly checking out the various buttons and screens on the dashboard. That was fairly entertaining to watch, so it eased the boredom.

It took about 15 minutes, but the three chatterboxes finally got moving again. They were eager to fight some vivosaurs by the sound of it, and hey, the guy's Buggy had broken down. Maybe he was surrounded by rogues. At least, that's what Jura told Tria and her little crew. That got them moving.

And yet despite their enthusiasm, they still managed to get side-tracked constantly, taking Jura with them. Tria even got him to drive down some random side road. The only bonus was that at the end of said side road there was a golden skull for an Alxas. The fossil itself looked pretty cool, and it made Jack a bit stronger.

They probably wouldn't have gotten much further had Liu Ren not given them a call. Jura wasn't exactly sure when his face had popped up on their monitor, but he only noticed it once he had started talking. Apparently they were looking for an archaeologist by the name of Thomas Digmore. His Bone Buggy had broken down while he was looking for artifacts.

He'd sent them off with that, leaving Nate, Tria, and Dahlia to all start cracking jokes about smart people being wimpy. Which Jura would have argued against if his only examples weren't Prof. Little and Yamamoto. Oh well.

Luckily he didn't have to listen to their remarks for much longer, as they spotted Digmore's Buggy rather quickly. It was one of those big, slow ones, and it was smoking like crazy. Also, a Sungari landed atop it, its claws raking across windows as its shrill cry echoed loudly.

"Alright, Jura. This is all you," Tria grinned, giving him a pat on the back. She then rested her shoes up on the dashboard, which mildly annoyed Jura because gosh darn it he'd have to wash that dirt off later, but he supposed she was letting him fight and that was all that mattered. So, partially out of curiosity and partially because he hated himself, Jura sifted through their vivosaurs until he found Jack.

The very loud and obnoxious Alxas flashed on to the field, golden claws flexing as he awkwardly jumped from foot to foot. "_HEY JURA! HOW'VE YOU BEEN?!"_

The redhead cringed; Jack was always louder than he remembered. "_Alright, I guess. We're in a battle now, so pay attention."_

"_GOT IT."_

Camber and Aito appeared not much later, each of them easily dwarfed by Jack. And surprisingly, a V-Raptor, its agile, feathered body a dark purple, shot out from behind the damaged Bone Buggy. It was about half the size of Camber but still had a menacing look to it.

Not wanting to wait for more rogues to appear, Nate quickly sent Aito after the V-Raptor. Hindquarters wriggling, the small Edapho lunged at the biped, teeth digging into its neck. The V-Raptor shook him off without too much effort, leaving Aito to scurry off. He didn't get too far, though, before the Sungari was upon him, beak nailing him in the side.

As Aito hissed with pain, the sharp, slightly garbled cry of the V-Raptor pierced the air. Another, more distant call answered back, causing Jura to tense up. The little bugger had called for help.

Taking a deep breath to calm his nerves, Jura leaned out his window. "_Well, maybe if we can take out these two before that other V-Raptor gets here, we won't have to worry about it." _With a satisfied nod, the redhead called out to Jack, "Claw Strike on the V-Raptor!"

Jack's strange scream-roar reverberated throughout the battlefield as he shot forward and aiming the tips of his claws towards the V-Raptor, almost like a skewer. Jura made sure to give him an Accuracy Up to ensure the velociraptor went down. Luckily, the impact wasn't nearly as messy as Jura had expected, and the purple creature just shrieked and flashed down to a dino gear. That hadn't been so bad. Hopefully the Sungari would go down as easily.

Speaking of which, Camber rocketed by the enthralled Jack, powerful skull aimed straight at the pinkish pterosaur. She leaped and, with a powerful twist of her body, slammed directly into the Sungari's back. It let out a shrill cry, body slamming against the ground painfully. But, it wasn't defeated.

And, about that time, the V-Raptor the other had called for came rushing on to the battlefield. Fantastic.

Still, the Sungari was barely staying out of its dino gear, and Nate took advantage of this. Aito quickly jumped atop the grounded reptile and made quick work of it with a nip to the neck. With a flash it was nothing more than a crimson disc beneath the Edapho's foot.

Of course, the new arrival was not too fond of seeing its comrade being defeated as soon as it arrived. It took off like a bullet, leaping towards Camber. Which Jura, albeit in a panicked fashion, took note of. He spammed Defense Ups, cringing as the V-Raptor made contact with Dahlia's Pachy. Its two protruding claws dug into either side of her, which definitely did a lot of damage. However, when the V-Raptor kicked off of her and landed with a backflip, Camber was thrown quite bodily to the ground. She struggled to stand back up.

Clearly this V-Raptor was stronger than the one it had replaced, so Jura figured he had to respond to it with a much stronger attack than before. And, thanks to that gold fossil Tria had led him to earlier, Jack just so happened to have a stronger attack. Nate having Aito just use Snapping Upper was also saving them a lot of FP.

Jura leaned out his window again, feeling a bit more confident after seeing how strong the attack was. "Alright, Jack! Use, uh, Dual Claws on that V-Raptor!"

The mangey Alxas jogged at the upright V-Raptor, his claws slashing its sides as he twisted around. Then, his foot still planted on the ground, Jack circled around and slashed it one more time, ending his attack in some kind of pirouette. The force of being hit twice in a row, especially by a vivosaur with an elemental advantage, basically wiped out the V-Raptor. It was tossed away with ease, flashing back into a green gear as it slowed.

"_JURA, LOOK. I'M A PRETTY BALLERINA!" _Jack shouted, raising his foot a bit higher in the air for emphasis. Groaning, Jura rested his face against the steering wheel as Tria's laughing mixed with Jack's obnoxious voice. It was quite, well, obnoxious.

* * *

**GUYS I DID IT I UPDATED ARE YOU PROUD OF ME.**

**Gosh I'm sorry it's been like two months, I got addicted to Fire Emblem right before spring break and then I just stopped updating mainly because of that. Also because I got hit with a streak of laziness and exams and such.  
Also, I apologize that this is a lot shorter than the chapters have been, I just have zero motivation to write further than this and I've been putting off writing further than this for like three days, so I thought 'hey, let's just put this stuff up and put the rest of the Digmore stuff in the next chapter'.**

**Anyways, I will definitely try harder to update earlier than two months from now, and also I just love Mei Lian to death so I will write faster to get to her faster. Maybe. We will see. XD**

**Also for the guest reviewer, John McCarthy, I'm aware that the canon Jura and Tria don't have freckles. Mine do, and that's about all there is to it. Honestly I'm not sure why it matters? ? ? Freckles are just aesthetically pleasing to me.**


	16. Artifacts and Salt

Their monitor changed from the battle layout to a bespectacled man whom Tria assumed was the Digmore they had come to rescue. He was surprisingly tan with orange hair, and definitely looked like a man of knowledge, not of strength. Which explained why he needed rescuing.

"Good heavens! I thought those things were going to tear me apart! Thank you so much! I owe you my life!" the man exclaimed, sounding relieved but still shaken up. He took a deep breath and, with a nervous smile, added on, "My name is Dr. Thomas Digmore, and I teach archaeology over at Fellings University. Again, you have my thanks, um…"

"Tria! And this is my bro, Jura!" said blunette shouted, shoving her brother away from the monitor enough to make her take up most of it. She didn't really care how dorky Digmore was, showing off just came naturally for her.

"Oh! I'm Nate."

"And I'm Dahlia!"

Grinning, Dr. Digmore clasped his hands and closed his eyes. "Jura, Tria, Nate, and Dahlia! Such wonderful names! The names of my heroes!"

Nate laughed nervously, hand rubbing at the back of his neck. "I wouldn't say we're _that_ big of a deal. Just a normal day for us Wardens…"

"Now hold on just a sec, Nate! I'd say we're pretty awesome!" Tria shot back, a confident grin on her face. There was no way in heck she was passing up on any sort of praise.

Unfortunately, Nate was actually focusing for once in his life. What a loser. "I mean, you're right, we're super cool, but we've also gotta haul this guy's Buggy back to base."

"Yeah, I guess you're right," the blunette grumbled in reply, complying despite wanting to hear more praise from Digmore. So, the three of them sort of got to work, Dahlia heading back to Europe since Tria was confident they could hook a Bone Buggy up to another one without too much trouble.

Basically, Nate backed his huge Buggy up to the front of Digmore's while Tria directed him quite loudly. His weird tank-like vehicle was super loud, after all, and she had to yell over it. That and, if she wasn't noticeable enough, she was fairly certain Nate would back over her, and that would stink.

Eventually they got everything lined up right and Tria hooked everything up. Everything being a chain with a hook on the end. They really didn't know what they were doing, but somehow it was going to work. After waving Nate off, the female twin jogged back to her Buggy and hopped back into the driver's seat, only to be greeted by Jura giving her a concerned look.

"What's your problem?" Tria asked in the rudest voice she could muster. Her brother sighed and rolled his eyes.

"Dr. Digmore wants us to find the artifact he was looking for.":

"Figures."

She fired up the sonar, immediately finding some pings nearby. They were registered in that category which was just 'any other fossil that's not bones'. Seemed like a good place to start.

The first few things were gems, which were always welcomed, but they obviously weren't what they needed to find. Then there was the weird circle-thing. Somehow that looked like it was and wasn't what they needed to find. That was a good sign.

Leaning over a bit, Tria gave her brother a quick nudge. "Hey, Jura. This look about right?"

"Maybe?" he half-asked, leaning closer towards the x-ray image. After a moment, he sat up and shrugged. "I'm not an archaeologist, just dig it up and let's go."

"Sounds good to me," Tria shrugged, grabbing the controls. The weird disc was super small, and also quite shallowly buried, so a few swipes of the drill quickly uncovered it. The object, though definitely some kind of fossilized artifact, looked strangely like a Dino Gear. A cartoon dinosaur was even etched along the front.

Tria opened the door and hopped out of their Buggy, yanking the relic out of the rock and examining it a bit more. It felt oddly unsettling to hold and look at. That might have been because of it looking like a new thing even though it was an old thing. Those types of things always gave her chills.

"Weird."

So, shoving the object into her pocket, the blunette returned to her vehicle without another thought.

* * *

"Yo, Tom! Got a thingie for you!"

Tria shot out from the garage, Jura in tow, towards Dr. Digmore and Nate, who were in front of that cool mechanical dinosaur. With a grin, she slapped the weird Dino Gear into Digmore's hands. She pointed finger guns at him as he began to examine it with wide, interested eyes. What a nerd.

"What is it?" Jura inquired, a bit short of breath. He leaned towards Digmore a bit more, almost like he was trying to hear his thoughts. It looked really funny.

The archaeologist tapped at his chin, eyes narrowing. "Well… It's a stone fashioned into the shape of a flat disc with what appears to be a dinosaur in the center."

"No durr," Tria grumbled, arms crossing.

"Just like a Dino Gear, huh?" Nate added in with a laugh, nudging at the blunette with his elbow, who soon joined in with the chuckling.

"Like Dino Gears could have existed then!" Tria shot back, causing the two of them to start laughing a bit harder. Honestly, their 'jokes' weren't that funny, but she was sort of used to Jura's jokes and his were just lame, so slightly better ones seemed hilarious.

Speak of the devil, Jura suddenly cleared his throat, bringing attention back to him. Which was soon diverted to Digmore. "As for the purpose of this disc… Perhaps a tool or object from a ritual?" The man held it up, hand rotating so he could inspect each angle. "Whatever the use, we can call it a Dinodisc." He suddenly grinned, doing a little victory dance. "Oh, how exciting! I'll finally be published in a peer-reviewed journal!"

"Sounds, uh, cool?" Tria smiled nervously, doing a couple of thumbs-up.

"Oh, it is!" Digmore replied, bright-eyed, "There may be more of these to find! Imagine discovering and excavating more! Err, except…" His excitement faded and a look of mild fear replaced it. "Those nasty rogue vivosaurs…"

Jura's face lit up, and all of a sudden Tria got the distinct feeling this wasn't going to be the last time they saw good ol' Tom. "Hey, Dr. Digmore, we could tag along with your searches!"

"Really?" The orange haired man seemed to think the matter over briefly before getting very giddy. That was the only way Tria could think of to describe it. "In that case... Nate, Jura, and Tria, will you be my Paleo Pals?"

"Sure!" Nate beamed, probably just happy to have been asked.

She decided to play along. "Why the heck not?"

"Fantastic!" Digmore cheered, getting out his Fighter License. For some reason it was a heck of a lot easier to get him registered as a Paleo Pal than it was to register Lucky. Not that it bothered Tria; more time to do other things, after all.

After that was sorted out, the four of them parted ways. Sort of. Dr. Digmore headed off to get started on his artifact report, and Nate, Jura, and Tria headed into HQ for supper. Tria was certain time changes were going to be the death of them.

But whatever. She got to hang out with Nate for a while longer, so that was cool. Oh, and also Roland and Penny. Their little group sat together at that same table they'd been at before Jura and Tria had headed off to America; Nate, Penny, and Roland on one side with Jura and Tria across from them.

"So, what's it like working for Stryker?" Nate asked, starting off with the most obvious question everyone had.

Tria grinned, taking a quick swig of her pop. "It's basically the best freaking thing ever," she stated in a slightly nonchalant voice, "We got to go screw around in all the parks! It's been a blast! Plus, the leader in America, Sean, is pretty much the coolest person I've ever met."

"I wouldn't say he's cooler than Stryker," Jura added on nervously, giving Tria a light nudge. She just started laughing incredulously.

"No, no, Sean's definitely cooler."

Her brother sighed in defeat, deciding to focus on his food instead of arguing with her. Which was smart of him. Nice to see he was using that big brain of his to think logically.

Penny spoke up next, albeit softly. "Hey Jura, how's Nibbles doing so far?"

The teen in question blinked a couple of times, obviously surprised he was being addressed instead of Tria, and struggled to swallow quickly. Tria, who was equally surprised, just chuckled at his 'misfortune'. He really needed to pay attention in conversations, otherwise he was never gonna be the social butterfly Tria considered herself to be.

Jura, after finally recomposing himself, gave Nibbles a quick pat on the head. "I think he's been doing really well. He gets along with our vivosaurs just fine, and he hasn't roared at any new people in a while."

"Just Nate!" Tria butted in, drawing laughs from Penny and Roland. Nate _was_ smiling, though. And rolling his eyes. That definitely counted as a win.

Her brother cleared his throat, bringing attention back to himself. Gosh he looked frustrated. "_Anyways_, I haven't been able to do any of the normal talking you can do with normal vivosaurs, but I think he half gets what I'm saying…"

The other three teens seemed interested, but unfortunately Tria was not. Heck, if the conversation was going to shift away from her, she was going to shift away from the conversation. So, completely zoning off from Jura, the blunette began to scan around the cafeteria.

It wasn't too full, seeing as dinner was less of a definite time to eat than lunch. There was kind of a mix of Wardens and average Fighters, though, which was sorta interesting. Some ninja kid was standing way off in a corner, eating like some lonely emo kid, so he was probably a Warden. A little blonde girl was sitting by herself and reading a textbook pretty intently, one that Tria partially recognized, so she might have been studying for the Warden Tests.

Oh, and then there was that purple haired girl. She was probably a year or so younger than her and Jura, but oh boy did she look mad. She was basically glaring holes into Jura, which was pretty funny for Tria, but also kind of worrying. Sure, she tried not to care so much about Jura, but gosh he was such a wimp, and it would really suck if he died.

Liu Ren was actually sitting next to her, which took Tria a few minutes to realize. That girl was just so ticked off that it was hard to look away. Anyways, he looked like he was trying to calm her down, which was failing miserably because she was just getting madder and madder. Heck, she went to stab her food with a fork and the fork snapped in half. Sure, it was just a plastic fork, but it was still pretty intense.

It suddenly dawned on Tria that she was mildly concerned about her brother, which was pretty annoying. She liked to think her lack of empathy kept her worry-free, or some crap like that, so any bit of pity or concern had to be eliminated as soon as possible. The only problem was that, at the moment, she wasn't sure how to go about doing that. After a couple moments of thought, the obvious conclusion was to ignore the concern and see what would happen.

Mauve eyes flicking back to Jura, Tria quickly re-immersed herself into the conversation, trying her best to seem as if she had been listening the entire time. Apparently they had moved away from Nibbles, thankfully, and were discussing the missions Nate, Penny, and Roland had been put on instead.

"It was the strangest thing I've ever seen," Penny smiled, glancing over to Nate. He already seemed flustered for some reason. "That Hypsi just would not let go of his leg. Though I doubt Nate's screaming was helping the situation…"

Tria broke out laughing at the thought of Nate being assaulted by a little Hypsi. Penny and Roland joined in, though in a much more contained fashion. It took only a few seconds for the blunette to realize she was laughing about something that wasn't meant to be super funny, and quickly brought it to an end.

"_Probably should've waited for them to laugh first…"_ Tria thought to herself, eyes flicking awkwardly between her friends. Between her lack of involvement in that conversation and that weird girl shooting Jura death glares, the whole cafeteria experience was really starting to lose all enjoyment. So, she figured it would be best to ignore her surroundings and eat some food.

* * *

"I heard the rescue was a success."

"You betcha!" Tria replied enthusiastically, shooting Liu Ren a thumbs up. Thankfully, after Liu Ren and the girl he was with had left, everyone had decided it was a good time to head off to do other things. So, she, Jura, and Nate had gone up to check in with Liu Ren, and luckily he had gone back to his office.

The branch leader nodded, a wide smile on his face. "Excellent work!" He then withdrew his Warden license and began the point awarding process. Unlike Sean, he was done in just a few taps. Liu Ren did seem more focused than Sean, though, so maybe that had something to do with it.

Then, all of a sudden, there was the soft whirring of the elevator opening, followed by a rather loud, "Alright, daddy, I'm calm now, I swear!" Tria turned to see who had come in and cringed upon identifying them. It was that girl from earlier.

She was dressed in clothes very similar to Liu Ren's, albeit much gaudier and more feminine, and had her purple locks up in two buns. And, surprisingly, she looked rather content. Tria glanced over to Jura, who looked intrigued but not upset in any way. Apparently he had missed all the looks, which was probably for the best.

"Ah, Mei Lian! Perfect timing," Liu Ren greeted her, a hint of nervousness to his voice despite having said 'perfect timing'. He cleared his throat, probably trying to hide his concern, and quickly added on, "Allow me to properly introduce our newest Wardens: Nate, Tria, and-"

"-JURA!" And, in less than a split second, Mei Lian had that insanely enraged look on her face again. Tria couldn't help but flinch. Normally she liked to think she was tough, but gosh that girl was startling.

Distance was closed between her brother and Mei Lian rapidly, and before anyone knew it there were about three inches between their faces. Jura had froze at that point, an incredibly obvious amount of fear etched across his countenance. Despite their obvious height difference, the purple haired girl sure had closed that space with ease. Nibbles snarled from behind Jura's legs, but Mei Lian completely ignored him.

"I've been looking for you!" she hissed, eyes narrowing even more. Her hands clenched into fists, and she took a step forward, forcing Jura to take one back. "You defeated that freaking Gorgo in Paradise Beach!"

Tria wanted to smack Jura when he nodded after that statement. He was digging his own grave, and it sure as heck looked painful.

The fan Mei Lian was holding was suddenly shoved against Jura's neck, and he swallowed hard in reply. "Well, that stupid rogue was MINE! I'd been hunting that sucker for ages! I got sent over to Fossil Park America to help out since they're short on Wardens, and when I got back you'd taken that thing out!"

There wasn't even a bit of hesitation. Mei Lian shifted straight into some kind of kung-fu fighting stance, looking as if she would pounce on Jura at any giving moment.

"AND NOW YOU'RE GOING TO PAY!"

Her somewhat crazy grey eyes flicked to Liu Ren all of sudden, who looked mildly alarmed. With a frustrated sigh she straightened back up into a normal, though definitely angry, standing position. Tria found a small amount of relief knowing that Mei Lian partially listened to someone.

Returning to Jura's personal space, the chinese teen continued her rant. "I, Mei Lian, hereby challenge you to a duel! The fight will take place at Lantern Lake's Xuan Wu Peak! It'll be a one-on-one, winner-take-all, Fossil Battle royale! Oh, and you're using that transforming vivosaur of yours!" She gestured to Nibbles with her fan before spinning around and stomping off towards the elevator.

Hitting the button for the elevator, Mei Lian turned around once more to, most likely, give Jura a few more threats while she waited for it. "I demand satisfaction! You'd better show up to the summit, and no excuses for not showing up! I already sent you the coordinates!" The doors slid open and she marched in, shouting out between the closing doors, "Until we meet again!"

Silence filled the room for almost a full minute after Mei Lian had gone. Then Jura was breaking out deep, gasping breaths, like he'd been holding them since Mei Lian had arrived. That and he was probably borderline having a panic attack. Which was, for once, understandable.

"Who in the heck was that?!" Jura managed to spit out after a couple minutes of evening out his breath. Nibbles let out a concerned rumbled and leaned against his Fighter's leg.

"I don't like to jump to conclusions based on first impressions, but holy crap she is CRAZY!" Nate exclaimed in agreement, tugging at his goggles nervously before giving Jura a pat on the back. "Lemme just say, I'd hate to be you right now, Jura!"

"I admit, Mei Lian does have something of a short fuse…" Liu Ren sighed, rubbing the back of his neck. "However, the work she does for us is beyond reproach. That and she is my daughter…"

Tria rolled her eyes. "She sure as heck doesn't act like it."

"I'm aware," the branch leader grumbled, turning his focus back to Jura. "As for this duel, no one will hold it against you if you don't go. Except, well, Mei Lian. And I'm certain she'll calm down eventually." Then, very softly, he added on, "...Like, say, a few years from now."

All eyes were on Jura as he stood there silently shaking, thinking over the situation. If she was completely honest, Tria wasn't quite sure what Jura would do, and he looked to be thinking about the same way. So, with a slight titter, she grabbed ahold of her brother's arm and started dragging him towards the elevator.

"You should probably sleep on it, bro. Rest up after all of today's excitement," Tria suggested, attempting to sling her arm around his shoulders. After a couple moments of anxious thought, Jura nodded weakly in agreement.

"Alrighty, then it's settled. We'll see you guys tomorrow at some point!" She waved to Liu Ren and Nate quick, shoving Jura into the elevator and selecting the bottom floor. Finally, they were getting closer to rest.

* * *

Tria laughed, tugging her bow out of her hair before stepping into the shower. "Gosh he's screwed. Do you think he's gonna go through with it?"

"_I mean… maybe. Just to sort things out, though,"_ Maisy answered softly.

The blunette rolled her eyes, still laughing. Jura was in bed dealing with his crisis, so out of sheer boredom she decided to take a shower. How long had it been since she'd had the last one? Whatever, it wasn't important. Maisy and Morton were keeping her company while she dealt with the monotonous task of personal hygiene.

"_I don't understand how you find this funny? You were flipping out over Mei Lian glaring at him earlier, and now you think it's entertaining?"_ Morton sighed, sending a wave of his stupidly paternal frustration over her. Gosh it was annoying.

"Morton, please. He's not gonna get stabbed or something. I got nothing to worry about now." Eyes squeezing shut, Tria returned to scrubbing shampoo into her obnoxious amount of hair. The last thing she wanted to hear was Morton telling her what a horrible person she was. Clearly she was aware of her level of horribleness.

Of course her Titano wasn't going to stop. "_Tria, just because you're sick of people roping you guys together doesn't mean you gotta act like you don't care about him."_

"But I _do_ care about him!" Tria shot back, fingers digging into her head harder in an attempt to release her frustration. It wasn't really working. "Honestly, 90% of the time he's just being a wimp. So, as long as he's not gonna get killed, I'm gonna ignore his problems!"

"_Oh my gosh…" _Morton groaned, more frustration billowing off of him. "_So what you're telling me is that you'll only intervene if you fear for his life?"_

She couldn't help but snort at that. "Pretty much."

"_What the heck is wrong with you?"_

"I dunno. Just thought it was good for him to toughen up."

"_For some reason, I'm having trouble believing that."_

Tria shut the water off, ringing her hair out before feeling around the outside of the shower for a towel. Maisy, who was much smaller than Morton and therefore out of her gear, put one on her back and trotted over to her Fighter, who gratefully took it.

"See Morton? That's what helpful vivosaurs do; they help their Fighters," the blunette stated spitefully whilst toweling her hair. Morton was a huge pain and she was certain he was completely aware of that.

She could sense him roll his eyes. "_I just want you and Jura to get along okay. Thought it was a helpful thing to do."_

"If I wanted a 'get along with your brother' speech, I would've called my mom today. Now shut your mouth and let me enjoy the rest of the evening."

* * *

**I said I was gonna update earlier than 2 months and I did! By one day ha ha**

**I'm sorry I took so freaking long again. I had to help with a thing at my church during the entire week I updated last time on, then I was on a missions trip for two weeks ha ha. It was fun, though. Got to see a lot, learn a lot, etc.  
THEN I JUST GOT LAZY YAY**

**Anyways, Mei Lian is in the next chapter and I love her to DEATH, so it will probably be faster. That and I wanna update before school starts for me at least one more time.  
On a side note I may try to update A Change of Pace as well before school starts. I miss my hipster dork and his hyperactive friend.**


	17. Road Rage and Flowers

Jura was having trouble thinking straight. His mind was racing from a combination of confusion and panic. It was really intense.

"_JURA! WHAT HAPPENED? WHY ARE YOU ACTING LIKE A LITTLE GIRL?"_

And, once again, Jack was there to give him a migraine and make everything worse.

"Jack, can we not do this right now?" Jura grumbled, rolling onto his side. The redhead was laying on his bed fully clothed, Nibbles curled up beside him. He didn't bother getting in his pajamas or getting under the covers because he had a feeling he wasn't going to be sleeping much.

Just as expected, Jack was still oblivious to the situation. "_CAN WE NOT DO WHAT RIGHT NOW? I DIDN'T THINK WE WERE DOING ANYTHING."_

"_I think he's referring to your volume level," _Racer sighed, his presence relaxing Jura. The redhead was always thankful that his sister let him carry their Tarbo. He was the only calm vivosaur he had.

Speaking of calm, the definitely not-calm air of Shrike came blasting into the conversation. "_Ohmygosh, Jack! You're so obnoxiously loud! It gets on _everyone's _nerves!"_

Jack, for once, took offense to this, and immediately retaliated with a slur of immature insults. And Jura was regretting taking his vivosaurs out for his problem. Grabbing all three of their gears, the teen stuffed them into his nightstand drawer and reveled in the resulting silence. It was nice for half a second, then it was back to the borderline panic attack.

Sweaty fingers ran through his way too long hair as he rolled onto his back. Nibbles shifted to place his maw atop Jura's stomach, which did soothe him a bit. Taking a deep breath, Jura began stroking his red vivosaur as he exhaled. Nibbles started purring during this, which made Jura smile briefly.

"Gosh I'm lucky to have you."

The two of them sat in silence after that as Jura attempted to clear his mind of getting assaulted by Mei Lian. Only after he'd managed to get his heart rate down did he decide to tackle the problem. As in, decide whether or not to fight her. At least it didn't take too long to figure out.

The way he saw it, this was something he had to take care of immediately. It was either that or have Mei Lian stalk him and threaten him on a daily basis. Well, that's what it seemed like she would do. She could be a decent person for all he knew, and if he avoided confronting her like a sane adult, then he could miss out on a cool friend, as stupid as it sounded.

"Man, Nibbles, it's a good thing I'm getting all of this stress out of the way on small things, huh?" Jura smiled, giving his partner a pat on the head. Nibbles gave a tired churr in agreement. At least, he assumed it was in agreement. It was best not to think too far into it.

Despite having calmed down enough to rationally make a decision, Jura still found himself concerned with what-ifs for a majority of the night. Mainly things concerning what would happen if he beat Mei Lian in the duel. Eventually he slipped into unconsciousness, breaking off his thoughts about her still being spiteful if he won.

* * *

He was quiet all through breakfast. Penny looked like she wanted to talk to him, but maybe she could tell from his body language he wasn't in the mood. Jura figured he was just lucky to have a friend who could read him like that.

Nate and Tria, in the meantime, discussed how crazy they thought Mei Lian was. The former of the pair kept trying to get Penny and Roland in on the conversation, but neither of them actually knew her. It was just a weird situation.

After breakfast, they were off to Xuan Wu Peak.

Tria drove, obviously, and she didn't do it dangerously just to freak him out. At least she had that much decency. Jura was too busy hugging Nibbles out of terror to brace himself for getting thrown around their vehicle.

Finally, after what felt like an agonizingly silent eternity, they reached the peak. Sure enough, there was Mei Lian. She was leaning against her Bone Buggy, which looked like a purple version of Dahlia's. Standing beside her, looking equally angry, was a V-Raptor. Its feathers stood on end all the way down its spine, giving it a much more intimidating appearance than average.

Jura took a deep breath, steeling himself as much as possible. Which, in reality, wasn't much at all, but at least he wasn't shaking like a leaf when he stepped out of their Bone Buggy. Nibbles stood beside him, snarling at their opponents. It made Jura feel a bit more secure.

Mei Lian spoke first, an air of cockiness to her. "So you came! I thought for sure you'd turn tail and run!" Her V-Raptor let out a few chirrs that mimicked laughter.

"W-well, I didn't. So n-now what?" Jura replied, trying his best to keep his voice from shaking.

Her eyes narrowed as a harsh scowl replaced her confident expression. "Get that stupid transforming vivosaur of yours ready, and let's fight! No Bone Buggies, no Support Shots, just a good old fashioned fight!"

"A-alright." Motioning for Nibbles to head to their 'arena', Jura anxiously rubbed his arm as he watched the small vivosaur glow, his body stretching and mutating into its larger form. Head lowered, tail lashing, the two of them awaited Mei Lian to call the first attack. Her vivosaur was obviously faster, after all.

Now she looked pumped. With a grin, Mei Lian pointed a Jura. "We're gonna thump you 'til you're sore, then thump you again! Jiao-long, Beak Snap!"

Hissing, the large V-Raptor shot off like a rocket, his streamlined body a purple blur. Heading straight towards Jura. Oh crap.

With a squeak, Jura leaped to the side. Jiao-long whizzed past him, claws digging into the earth as the feathered brute slid to a stop as to not crash into Jura and Tria's Buggy. Then he was off again, this time aiming for Nibbles. Jura took note of the grin on the V-Raptor's face as he passed by. Must have been some kind of fake-out routine. It definitely worked, he was having trouble thinking straight now.

Weaving all around Nibbles and leaving him confused and glancing around rapidly, Jiao-long suddenly came in for a sharp bite to Nibbles' neck. His feet kicked into the Fire vivosaur's side, knocking Nibbles off balance and leaving a few good gashes in his side. Nibbles hissed through the pain, shooting a slightly frustrated look over to Jura.

The redhead gulped, trying his best to follow Jiao-long's movements. The V-Raptor was moving incredibly fast, but for some reason was definitely holding a pattern. It probably aided in smooth movements, as he didn't have to think about directions as often.

Pointing at a certain spot just off to Nibbles' left, trying his best to keep his arm steady, Jura stammered out, "S-saurus Lunge!"

Nibbles definitely looked perplexed, but obeyed. He crouched down, haunches wriggling, then leaped. As he descended, the transformed vivosaur noticed that Jiao-long was buzzing by in his direction. Grinning, Nibbles aimed his attack more precisely, coming down directly atop the V-Raptor. His maw snapped shut on the back of the feathered reptile's neck, and as the two tumbled across the ground Nibbles released him, leaving Jiao-long to bounce away.

Both of them thrashed back to their feet, equally strained at that point. Unfortunately for Jura, Mei Lian's vivosaur was just as mad as she was. Mad enough, in fact, to ignore his wounds and lunge at Nibbles with as much force as his first attack. Teeth snapped against Nibbles' spine as Jiao-long came down upon him, his sickle claws purposefully slashing along the Fire vivosaur's flank.

Jura cringed, mind racing as Nibbles writhed around in an attempt to shake off Jiao-long. He was surprised at how brutal the V-Raptor was. The rogues from earlier weren't nearly as relentless, and they were wild animals. Judging by Mei Lian's expression, she didn't seem surprised about that. Maybe she was too ticked off to care.

Well, whatever the reason, Nibbles was getting his side made into ribbons, and Jura definitely had to make that stop. He mentally shuffled through attacks, shouting to his vivosaur, "Th-throw him off with Saurus Snap!"

Growling, Nibbles bit down on Jiao-long's nearest appendage, his left leg, then yanked for all he was worth. The V-Raptor's teeth were ripped free from his back, and the feathered brute was dragged along the ground. Nibbles then threw him off in some random direction, which just so happened to be where Mei Lian was.

She gasped and ducked as her V-Raptor flew by and slammed into her Bone Buggy, flashing into his green Dino Gear. Mei Lian stared at it in shock, then picked up the Gear to glare at it. Jura couldn't tell if she was mad at Jiao-long or him.

Either way, it never hurt to be polite. After Nibbles had shifted back down to his normal form, he and Jura walked nervously over to Mei Lian. She turned towards Jura, still looking cross.

"What do _you_ want?" she grumbled, crossing her arms and slouching. At least she didn't look like she wanted to attack him now.

Jura rubbed the back of his neck, glancing off to the side. "I was just gonna say, um, you were pretty tough?" He smiled awkwardly, hoping and praying that would be enough to appease her.

Mei Lian looked taken aback, which surprised him at first. Then, taking a deep breath, she sighed and hung her head. "I'm… I'm sorry about all this. I shouldn't have gotten so mad about the Gorgo…"

Blinking a few times out of shock, Jura pushed away the remaining fear of Mei Lian and managed to smile. "Oh, that's okay. I can kinda get why you were so upset, anyways."

"But it's not okay!" Mei Lian shot back, glancing off to the side, "I got you all stressed out for no reason! I just…" Suddenly she was giving him a very intense look, which made Jura really uncomfortable, then was beaming like nothing bad had gone on between them. "You know what? I'm not angry anymore! And I totally understand you now!"

"You do?" Jura responded, a bit confused. It was a little weird that Mei Lian was super happy already, but he decided not to question it.

"Yeah! More than that, I think I like you!" she cheered, hugging Jura out of nowhere. Already he was feeling kind of weird about what she'd just said, and now she was doing that. He briefly considered pushing her off, but the more Jura thought about it the more he realized that no one had actually hugged him in like a month. It felt nice.

Once Mei Lian had let go of him, her grey eyes lit up as they noticed Nibbles. "Oh! And I like your little vivo buddy too!" The small vivosaur chirred at the statement, and Jura smiled. She was just really blunt about everything.

"Well, we both like you, too!" Jura chirped in reply, drawing a larger grin out of Mei Lian.

She bounced from foot to foot, excitement pouring off of her. "Great! Then let's be Paleo Pals!"

"Sounds great!"

Mei Lian broke out in squeals, quickly running over to the front door of her Bone Buggy to retrieve her Warden License. Jura pulled his and Tria's out of one of his many pouches, and the two of them exchanged information. The purple haired girl hugged him one more time, exclaiming, "I haven't been this happy in forever!"

She looked like she wanted to say more, but before she could get to it Nibbles let out some weird growl. Jura immediately focused on him, afraid that his injuries from the fight were much worse than expected, but was surprised to find Nibbles glowing. The little guy never transformed unless it was for battle specifically, so seeing him start to go at that time was weird.

His body morphed into a larger shape, as per usual, but then the shape kept getting bigger. What looked to be a massive horn started to form atop his snout. The light faded away, leaving a much more theropod-esque Nibbles in its wake. He towered over the two of them, his large teeth twisting into a frighteningly large grin. Then, as always, he flashed back down to his basic form.

"Woah! That was so cool!" Mei Lian shouted, hands clenching into fists excitedly. "He transformed again! Maybe he'll do it again if you wait long enough!" Her eyes lit up again as she sang, "That's gonna be awesome~!"

"You really think so?" Jura thought aloud, casting a glance to his exhausted partner. He had to admit, the thought of Nibbles getting progressively stronger and cooler forms was very appealing. He was excited to see if Mei Lian was right.

She nodded enthusiastically. "Of course!" Her excitement soon faded, though, as something seemed to occur to her. "Oh, wait."

"What?"

"I should probably go tell my dad I didn't kill you, huh?" Mei Lian laughed weakly, trying her best to look happy again. It wasn't really working.

Jura wasn't exactly sure why she wasn't happy about talking with Liu Ren, but he figured they weren't really close enough friends for him to ask. So, once again, he decided to just be polite about it. "Oh yeah, sure. I'll see you later, then?"

"Definitely, pal!" she replied, brightening up a bit more. Waving goodbye, the two of them headed off to their respective Bone Buggies. Mei Lian had already driven off by the time Jura had opened the passenger door.

He picked up Nibbles, who was obviously sore and in need of some bandaging from Prof. Little, and set him down on the seat. As Jura began to climb in, he heard Tria already beginning to laugh at him. Fantastic.

"Hey bro, nice fight! Did you get her number?" Tria cackled, a smug look on her face. Rolling his eyes, Jura slid into his seat and buckled in, all the while trying his best to express his displeasure.

"You're hilarious, Tria, really."

She just laughed again, as expected, and started up the Buggy. Then they were off down the long, twisting path to the base of the mountain. The drive down was quiet, as Jura didn't want to talk to his sister if she was going to heckle him. He was certain Tria wouldn't start up a conversation, anyways. She was too busy running comebacks through her head.

Out of nowhere, though, a quiet, sort of deep voice interrupted the silence. "_Hi, Jura."_

Jura blinked a couple of times, immediately scouring their area to see who could have spoke. None of their Dino Gears were in there, and Tria definitely hadn't said that. He shrugged it off as his imagination and leaned back in his seat as he thought over the duel with Mei Lian.

"_Jura. Hi, Jura."_

No, no, he definitely didn't imagine that. Jura rechecked the area once more, and there weren't any misplaced Gears to be found. It was just him, Tria, and-

"_Nibbles?"_

His green eyes shot down to the small vivosaur sitting on his lap. Nibbles was staring right back at him, his equally green eyes full of excitement. "_Jura!"_

"You can talk now?" Jura blurted out, a bit too surprised to just reply mentally.

Instead of the articulate response he was expecting, all that came in response was, "_Jura! Friend! Can talk!"_

Tria caught wind of their conversation and, of course, butted in. "Did that eyesore of yours finally figure out some English?"

"A little bit, I think," Jura stated slowly, eyes narrowing slightly. "Maybe when he evolved into that new form he evolved some basic vivosaur skills."

"Could be," his sister replied, immediately uninterested. Why'd she even bother getting into the conversation if she was just going to lose interest?

Sighing, definitely frustrated, Jura decided to stare out the window for the rest of the trip home. Gosh Tria was the worst. At least he could kind of talk to Nibbles now. It would be nicer if he didn't talk like a baby who knew only a handful of words.

* * *

Crisis now averted, Jura figured then would be as good a time as any to go check out the Fossil Mart. Apparently things to assist digging were sold there, as well as fossils. It definitely sounded worth a look.

The interior was quite similar to that of Warden HQ, having the same metal floors and walls. Even the fake and real plants were similar. The main difference were the fossils and Bone Buggy parts hanging from the walls, which were sort of interesting. A blonde woman was running the counter currently.

Surprisingly, they didn't sell much. Just some small batteries to extend the life of the large one that powered their digging tools, some chisels, and fossils. Even then they were randomly selected and he could only pick one. Picking up some chisels and time extenders, Jura headed back out with Nibbles and a very bored Tria in his wake.

Half way out the door, he was halted by a sudden shout. "Howdy, there! Can I talk to y'all?" a young, feminine voice exclaimed, an obvious southern twang to her words.

Jura turned around, obviously not wanting to be rude, and came face to face with a surprisignly tall little cowgirl with sandy hair and a mess of freckles across her face. She looked like she'd come straight from a farm, what with the way her overalls were worn out and how tan she appeared. It was actually quite surprising, really, because she didn't look much older than Lucky or Little.

"Can I help you with something?" Jura inquired politely, trying his best to come off as friendly. The girl sighed, her frustration evident.

"All right, so here's the deal. I got some homework on dropping fossils I need help with," she began confidently, ending on a more nervous note as it occurred to her how weird that statement was. "Err, sorry, guess it's a mite weird talking 'bout droppin' fossils with a person you just met, huh?"

Tria laughed, stepping up to Jura's side. Oh boy. "Nah, it's not too big a' deal. Jura's the perfect person to ask for homework help, anyways. He basically knows everything."

"Really? That's great!" the girl beamed, her relief evident. She cleared her throat, holding her hand out for Jura to shake it. "My name's Daisy! I'm studyin' to be a Warden."

Jura was mildly surprised that she went straight for a handshake, but was simltaneously impressed by her politeness. It was very refreshing. He shook it, smiling down to her smaller form. "And, like my sister said, I'm Jura. And I actually am a Warden."

A couple of shocked blinks. "No foolin'? _You're_ a Warden? Heck, you ain't much older'n me!"

All right, that was kind of weird. "How old do you think we are?" Jura asked, brow furrowing out of confusion.

"I dunno, 13 or somethin'?"

"We're 15."

"16 in like a month, actually!" Tria chimed in, shooting finger guns at Daisy.

She glared down at her feet, arms crossing. "Golly! No wonder I'm having so much trouble with this Warden Test! Ya'll're like 4 years ahead of me!"

Well, he wasn't expecting her to say that. Studying to be a Warden was one thing, but actually taking the test? Jura was certain she had to be older to do that. Maybe there was some weird Junior Wardens program or something, because having an eleven-year-old doing full Warden duties seemed like a reckless thing to do. That and the written tests were a nightmare to study _and _take, and he was at the top of his class.

Well, whatever program she was in, she obviously needed help. "What seems to be giving you trouble?" Jura asked, figuring it was something small he could answer quickly. Oh how he was wrong.

She whipped out a folded up piece of paper from her pocket. "I got this dumb essay to write on droppin' fossils, which are about as foul as foul gets, and I put it off so long that I don't got time to do the research!" Upon saying this, Daisy unfolded the paper, which looked like some sort of syllabus. Oh boy oh boy.

"Anyways, there's a mule's load a' droppin' fossils out there, but I gotta write on them gold ones. I hear there's a ton in some pool in Goldrush Canyon," she continued, checking over the list on her paper quickly. "Do y'all think you can rustle one up for me? It'd be a real help, pard!"

She then stared straight up at Jura with baby blue puppy dog eyes, which was definitely a first for him. They were actually quite effective, as a result, and he felt compelled to agree. Tria spoke up first, though.

"Woah, woah, woah. Hold your horses!" the blunette exclaimed, a knowing smirk on her face, "Are you asking us to help you cheat?"

Daisy cringed, a nervous look to her. "No! Err, maybe… But I don't care! I wanna pass, gosh darn it!" She crumpled the paper in her hand for emphasis, making Tria even happier for some reason.

"Alright, we'll do it!"

"We'll do what now?" Jura questioned, eyes wide. Why in the heck was Tria agreeing to help he-

"Dude, she's basically just a smaller, more southern version of myself!"

Oh gosh no.

"A cheater after my own heart!"

Thankfully, Daisy seemed flustered by Tria's comments, so there must have been a little bit of decency left in her. "That's, err, right sweet a' 'yall! I'll be here with my nose in a big ol' book, so swing by after ya' find the durn thing." She finished with a wide, grateful grin, reaching down to pick up said book.

"Alright, we'll make sure to do that!" Jura nodded, starting to feel a bit reluctant. Not that he'd say anything about it, because Tria _always_ dictated what they did. She was just too… energetic to argue against.

At least this was for a sort of good cause.

* * *

**Ehhhh, I updated before school like I said! I start on the 6th btw.  
As for A Change of Pace, I'll sit down tomorrow and see what I can get done. Pull up the things needed, figure out some battles because I forgot to detail them properly in my notes ha ha ha  
**

**But just as a heads up I may just update this again because wowzers we're getting to my favorite characters and their development and yessss.  
I really like Daisy for some reason. Like, _really_ like Daisy.  
Mei Lian is also my child tho  
All of these characters are my children tho**


	18. Puns and Paranoia

"I guess you could say this is a really _crappy_ task."

"Tria, no."

"It's gonna take a _crap _ton of time to get done."

"_Tria_."

Snickering, Tria stuck her tongue out at Jura. He never had been a fan of her puns. Whatever, that was his loss. All she was doing was making their trip less boring.

The two of them were driving through Goldrush Canyon up to that pool Daisy had mentioned. Tria actually knew where it was, seeing as they'd gone there once or twice looking for Ptera fossils with Leon, so she didn't have to drive around aimlessly for a couple of hours to find it. Finding the golden dropping fossil took almost no time at all, and just like the normal variant it was extremely easy to clean. Tria set it on the dashboard as a joke, since she knew it would bother Jura.

The whole chore took about half an hour, so when they got back to Daisy she was a bit surprised. "Ya'll got that droppin' fossil already?"

"Yup! Got it right here!" Tria grinned, holding out the nasty thing. The blonde took it gratefully, examining it quickly while muttering little notes to herself.

"Well, we were glad to help," Jura stated after a few moments of Daisy's murmuring. She smiled nervously, slipping the fossil into the bag she had with her, which was obviously filled with books.

Her hands twiddled around behind her back as she glanced off to the side. "Actually, I was kinda hopin' ya'll could help me out with somethin' else…"

Tria's eyes lit up. She was already quite fond of Daisy, and the thought of helping her become more like herself was pretty appealing. So, trying her best to contain her happiness, she quickly answered with, "Sure! We've got nothing better to do!"

"Really? Ya'll're the best, Tria!" Daisy beamed, "Soon as I'm a Warden, let's be pards!"

"I'm down for that! Now whaddya need help with?"

Reaching into a pocket on her overalls, Daisy withdrew a small blue Dino Gear, a cartoonish Hypsi etched on its center. "I got these durn tests in the bag, but there's still the battlin' part. I love my Hypsi'n all, but the gosh durn thing is weaker'n a lame horse!"

That sounded about right. Tria nodded slowly, thinking back to Penny's Hypsi. Sure, Alto was fairly aggressive, but it didn't really make up for her unappealing moveset. In fact, Tria was certain Penny wouldn't have passed the Warden Test if she hadn't been paired up with Dahlia. Clearly Daisy would need a bit of help getting her Hypsi up to snuff.

"Oh yeah, I know exactly what you mean," Tria laughed, giving Daisy an assuring grin. She put an arm around the smaller girl's shoulders confidently. "Jura and I'll take you out to get some gold fossils and do some training with that thing."

* * *

And so they did. Sort of. Jura was mainly there to make it legal for Tria to drive their Bone Buggy. Other than that he didn't do anything.

The three of them headed over to America, since Daisy's Hypsi was the US variant. It was starting to get dark, so Tria figured they had to be sort of quick. Of course, finding the correct gold fossils in a Challenge Route is always horribly difficult, so it took them about an hour to get all of them. Daisy's Hypsi, Annabel, already seemed stronger.

They went back to Asia for lunch since it was so late in America, and also because there was free lunch in Warden HQ's cafeteria. Free food was the best kind, after all. That, and Tria got to introduce Daisy to Nate. She wanted everyone to know about the kid she was bringing up under her wing.

While Daisy did seem pretty weirded out, though honestly everyone was pretty weirded out by Nate, Tria was certain she had fun. Talking to Wardens was probably really cool in her mind. Jura was a ways away from them, though still at the same table, with Mei Lian. She was sitting strangely close to him, which Tria took note of. More things to tease her brother about later.

After that it was out to Lantern Lake to go dig some fossils and get some training in with Daisy. Mei Lian tagged along, since apparently she was Jura's new shadow. Not that Tria minded her being there. Her excitement was rather refreshing in Dahlia and Nate's absence.

Eventually, after going off a ramp and scaring the crap out of Jura, Tria settled on a fossil she wanted to clean. Well, it was more like an entire skeleton. Either way, it was going to be freaking awesome trying out some of those new doo-dads from the Fossil Mart.

The chisels were especially helpful, seeing as she was cleaning a whole vivosaur. A _ton_ of hammering, drilling, and time extenders later, the finished bones ended up at 94 points. Nice.

The revival machine quickly set to work, rainbow energy enveloping the bones and adding living tissue to them. Slowly but surely, the creature expanded to just a bit taller than their Bone Buggy, its body about twenty feet long. Then the light was gone, and holy smokes was that thing awesome.

It was a ceratopsid, its green body laced with orange and gold. Its head was encased in orange, almost like a helmet, which fanned into large, curled spikes. A large, intricately laced blade protruded from its snout in place of a horn. A graceful, almost powerful aura seemed to loom off of it.

"_Hello, human,"_ a smooth voice stated calmly, obviously coming from the great beast. The monitor was saying he was a Sinocera.

"_Hello to you, too!"_ Tria answered, legs kicking with anticipation.

The quadruped's large, golden eyes examined her closely, a tint of curiosity flickering within them. "_Who are you? What are your intentions?"_

"_Umm…" _Well, that was a sort of weird thing to ask. "_I'm Tria! And, uh, my intentions are… fighting in Fossil Battles?"_

"_Fossil Battles?"_

Oh boy. "_Y'know, vivosaur fights? I'd use you to beat the crap out of other vivos!" _A grin spread across Tria's face as she made a quick punching motion. "_We'll annihilate the competition!"_

There was a brief pause, then guffawing laughter. The Sinocera tapped his blade to the Bone Buggy, determination radiating off of him. "_I like the sound of that! For glory!"_

"_For glory!" _Tria shot back, laughing. He was gonna be a riot to have around. Nothing like Morton and Maisy. And she already had the perfect name picked out for him.

"_Can I call you Long?"_

"_I don't see why not,"_ he rumbled back, amused. Beaming, Tria glanced over to her brother. He was doing something with their License, and noticed immediately when she started to stare.

Jura rolled his eyes, probably reacting to something she hadn't said yet. "Mei Lian keeps sending me messages."

"Wow, messaging already, huh?" Yep, there was that same glare. Oh well, it was totally worth it.

"We should probably get back to helping Daisy," Jura grumbled back, unwilling to give her the satisfaction of a defensive answer. Gosh darn it, he was getting used to her teasing. She'd have to work on fixing that.

She did, however, agree with his off-topic statement, so that meant she was required to let her teasing go. "Yeah, whatever, let's go hit up some Seven Scrambles with her. We can bring ol' Tom along, too!"

Judging by the way her brother's eyes lit up, he was pleasantly surprised by her reply. "Oh yeah! Great idea, sis!" he beamed, nodding enthusiastically, "I've been feeling a little guilty we haven't been helping him learn how to battle."

"Then it's settled! Let's head back to the Park and get going!"

* * *

"An American lady with a ponytail?"

"Yeah! She looked crazy paranoid. Wanted me to tell you to swing by if I ran into you." Nate nodded once, like he was assuring himself the statement was correct.

Tria snickered, casting a knowing look over to her brother. "Oh yeah, sounds like Becky."

"Definitely," Jura replied, obviously trying not to smile. He probably didn't want Nate to think Becky was normally paranoid, but Tria was fairly certain it was obvious.

"Thanks for telling us, dude," Tria said, turning her attention back to Nate. He grinned, pulling at his goggles. Must have turned into some sort of not-nervous tick.

"No problem!" His blue eyes nervously shifted to Nibbles, who was glaring daggers right back. "I, uh, think I'm gonna skedaddle before a certain someone gets hungry for a certain something."

Nibbles snarled all of a sudden, causing Nate to squeal and shoot off like an elephant from a mouse. When trilling laugh-growls came from the tiny vivosaur seconds later, Tria couldn't help but crack a grin. There was something so wonderful about him messing with Nate.

The three of them headed over to Fossil Park America despite that fact that it was around eleven o'clock at night there. Tria's only question was why the heck Becky was still awake at eleven when she had to be up around six or so. Then again, Nate _had_ said she looked paranoid. From what she could remember about Becky, some random thing keeping her up didn't seem _too_ far-fetched.

For once the World Gate didn't seem nauseating, although it was still a tad disorienting. Maybe that was why she didn't notice they were followed through it until someone was pulling at her arm. Upon glancing behind her, Tria was mildly surprised to see Daisy with a sort of determined look on her face.

"Oh, hey kid. What's up?" the blunette chirped, hands resting on her hips.

"I, uh, wanted ta' tag along with y'all," Daisy began, a hopeful glint in her eyes that Tria had to respect. "It's just, ya'll're doing Warden stuff right now, and I figured I could learn a thing'r two."

Tria nodded, giving the girl a thumbs-up. "Yeah, sure! Just stay here 'till we get back. Don't really know if we're gonna have to fight anything or what, but if we gotta you sure as heck can come!"

"Golly! Thanks a ton, Tria! I'll meet ya' in the Garage!"

The little cowgirl ran off, a grin on her face, leaving Jura glaring slightly at Tria. There he was, overreacting again. She just wanted to help the kid out.

"We can't just lug her around with us, Tria. It's not safe," Jura pointed out immediately, causing Tria to scoff. Gosh, he was a worry wart.

"C'mon, bro! We're just gonna take her out on one mission, and that's still not concrete. Becks could just be flipping out over nothing," she replied confidently, giving her brother a smack on the back.

He cringed, casting her dirty look. "Fine, but if something happens it's on you."

"Fair enough."

They headed up the stairs to Sean's office, Nibbles weaving in and out of their legs. Tria was shocked she didn't trip over him, and even more shocked that Jura was completely used to his vivosaur's weird habit. He wasn't even looking at the little bugger and he had no trouble whatsoever.

Finally they reached the top. Tria had expected to see Sean at the desk, but instead there was Leon. He was watching Becky pace around the room like a caged animal, a slightly concerned look on his face. His eyes shifted over to the twins, amusement replacing his worry.

"Hey Becks, the twins're here," Leon smirked, gesturing to them with his thumb. Becky spun around, looking quite relieved, and shot over to Jura and Tria.

She seemed just a little too excited. "Thanks so much for coming, guys! I've got a huge favor to ask you! You see, there's trouble out at one of our dig sites, at least, I think there is, and-"

"Woah, woah, woah, hold on a sec," Tria interrupted, holding her hands up, "What do you mean you _think_ there's trouble?"

"Weeelll it's more of a hunch than anything-"

"It's paranoia more than anything," Leon butted in, earning a sharp glare from Becky.

"It's not paranoia! I'm 90% sure something's going on in Dusty Steppes," the blonde shot back, hands going to her hips.

"Yeah, and that somethin's a sandstorm."

"Leon, so help me-!"

The purple haired teen broke out laughing, arms crossing. "Geez Becks, I'm just screwin' with ya'. This job's freakin' boring."

Becky rolled her eyes, huffing. "_Anyways_, there's something suspicious going on in Dusty Steppes, and I wanted you two to help me investigate." She focused back on the twins, who were equally amused by the situation.

"Why isn't Leon helping you?" Jura asked, finger compulsively tugging at the fabric around his neck. Tria found herself nodding in agreement, equally confused.

"He's on night shift, so he's holding down the fort," Becky replied confidently, a sour glance over to Leon ending her statement. "Besides, he'll just make fun of me the whole time. It'll be like having Sean along."

"That's 'cause Chief'n I know how bad you get."

"You're not a part of this conversation Leon, butt out!"

Leon snickered again, leaning back in his chair. Tria couldn't help but grin at him. The whole situation was getting funnier by the second.

But all good things had to come to an end, and Tria figured Becky had gotten heckled enough for the meantime. She didn't want to have to deal with ticked off Becky, after all. "Alright, enough of this crap, let's go head out to this place so Becks can get some sleep."

"Yeah, you've gotta be exhausted," Jura agreed, probably trying to move things along. It definitely helped.

Becky brightened up at the comments. "I _am_ pretty wiped out. So yeah, let's just take care of this so I can get some rest."

* * *

Dusty Steppes was freezing cold and barren. Tria hadn't realized deserts got so chilly at night. The whole environment was kind of surreal, actually. There weren't very many vivosaurs; just an occasional Lophus. Jura said they were cathemeral, whatever that meant.

Apparently there had been a rockslide or something in the back of the dig site that was freaking Becky out. It was blocking a path off, which she thought was suspicious as heck. Tria was more inclined to agree with Leon after hearing all that. Some rocks moved, big whoop.

But, no matter how paranoid Tria thought she was being, they'd already agreed to tag along with her. That and Daisy wanted to go out and do Warden stuff, so gosh darn it she was gonna take her out and do Warden stuff. Even if that stuff was just driving out to look at some rocks.

Tria drove, obviously. Jura and Nibbles looked like they were talking about something. Bone Buggy rides were _super_ boring now that that eyesore could mentally talk a little bit. Not that she missed _talking_ with Jura; she missed harassing him.

The place Becky had mentioned took about ten minutes to drive to. There was a narrow pass with a secondary path blocked off by a metal gate of sorts. And, surprisingly, there was just one huge rock. Huh. Maybe she'd been on to something.

"See? There are Bone Buggy tracks all around this thing!" Becky exclaimed over the monitor, gesturing towards the indentations around the gigantic boulder. "I knew I wasn't crazy!"

"Uh, that's nice and all Becks, but what're we gonna do about this thing?" Jura inquired, a hand running down Nibbles back. Gosh those two were getting chummy.

She strummed her fingers on her steering wheel, mulling the question over. "Well, we're definitely not moving it. We'd need a front-end loader or something."

Tria didn't know what that was.

"Guess we're gonna have to break down the gate."

"WHY?" Jura asked loudly, beginning to look nervous, "I mean, don't you have keys for it?"

Becky seemed a bit surprised by his question. "No, actually. It'll take to long to drive back, anyways." There was a brief pause, followed by a spiteful glare to the side. "I'm also really ticked right now and this'll make me feel a little better."

"Heck yeah! Ram it! Ram it!" Tria chanted, eyes lighting up. Any sort of action, even if it _was_ just smashing through a metal gate, was completely welcome in her book.

Engine revving, Becky slammed her rather box-like vehicle into the metal bars. They groaned, creaking apart and crashing into the ground. The blonde grinned, letting out a satisfied sigh.

"Alright, come over here!" she shouted, waiting for the twins and Daisy to follow her through the gate. "There's a secret path this way only for Wardens."

Daisy spoke up for the first time since they'd gone out. "Golly! I'm sure feelin' special right now." She was rubbing her arm bashfully, staring down at her feet.

"That's because you're freaking awesome," Tria replied, shooting her finger guns with a grin. "Now let's go check this place out!"

Smashing her foot against the gas, Tria broke out laughing as their Bone Buggy lurched forward. Jura squealed, clutching Nibbles to his chest. She didn't really care, though, since it had been forever since she'd been able to drive obscenely fast.

"Be careful! There's a lot of moving sand up there!"

Completely ignoring Becky's warning, the blunette plowed on through the sand, cheering as it swerved to and fro. That was probably the highlight of her day. Losing control was her jam.

But, it definitely wasn't Jura's. He was screaming like the baby he was, Nibbles wailing right along with him. It was really pathetic, but like, in a really funny way.

Eventually, after narrowly dodging random rocks Tria really couldn't see in the dark, and almost going right off a cliff, the three of them reached a cave with a bluish glow to it. There wasn't any obvious light source to cause it, the place was just blue. Alright then.

Three Bone Buggies were digging around the bluest part of the cave, and judging by how basic the vehicles were they weren't owned by Wardens. That and Becky was really ticked about them being there.

"Those guys must've put that rock in the path!" she shouted, an obvious note of frustration to her voice. Some weird static-y noise came in after a couple seconds, which Tria assumed was Becky trying to get into their radio frequency. It would be fun to learn how to do that at some point. Lots of pranks could come out of that.

Finally, after a minute or so, some really shady sounding voices started coming in.

"The sonar's pinging like crazy! It's gotta be around here somewhere!"

"Then hurry up and find the darn thing! The whole BR Brigade's counting on us!"

A sharp inhale came from Becky and Jura simultaneously. Even Tria, who normally wasn't phased by anything, felt her blood run cold for a couple milliseconds. That was that one organization Nate had told her about. That couldn't be good.

"Stryker definitely took care of those guys five years ago…" Becky muttered to herself, fingers strumming on her steering wheel. Tria couldn't tell if it was some nervous tick or if she was getting mad. "Look at 'em struttin' around like the own the place…"

No, that was definitely mad.

A quivering, unsure voice interrupted the somber mood. "Um… Are we gon' attack 'em?" Daisy murmured awkwardly. Despite being the youngest and least aware of the situation, she was actually thinking more than everyone else. That was just more proof that she was great, Tria decided.

"Oh! Yeah, definitely!" the eldest teen nodded, refocusing on actually stopping those morons. "Let's get 'em!"

They drove up to the three Buggies, two of which responded with hostility. "Nuts! It's the Wardens!" one shouted, the other letting out a surprised squeal.

"GUYS! Guys, I found it! The Electrominite fossil!"

Becky seemed to have planned on telling them to surrender, but seeing as they shot out Dino Gears upon hearing that statement that wasn't happening. So, the obvious response was to send out theirs as well.

"I'm trying out Long!" Tria exclaimed, cutting off Jura from sending Nibbles out the window. He rolled his eyes, watching her as she slammed her hand down on the monitor. Long flashed to life, his intricately colored body strongly contrasting with Becky's Big Allo, Bentley, and Daisy's Hypsi US, Annabel.

The opposing BR Brigade thugs had two vivosaurs between them - a Dimetro and Stygi. However, they looked a bit off. Okay, way off. The Dimetro's white markings were a dark grey, its eyes wide and angry. The Stygi appeared to have blotches of grey-purple discoloration scattered across its body, like it was sickly. It was equally enraged.

Annabel went first. All the gold fossils and extra training really had paid off. She charged forward, head slamming into the similarly sized Dimetro's side, knocking it onto its side. It hissed, scrambling back up to its feet.

The small Stygi shot towards Long head first, suddenly standing upright and slugging the significantly larger ceratopsid in the face, darting away just as quickly as it came. Long shook his massive head, snorting.

The Dimetro was next, flattening itself to the ground and hissing as its sail wriggled rapidly. A strange, ghastly pattern spread out from its feet as a purple aura filled the cave. Its Fighter might have sneaked in an LP Recovery among the sticky mess.

Anabel was hit with the highest concentration of the aura, some of it clinging to her and leaving her visibly weakened. Must have been poison. The aftereffects settled on Bentley and Long, the former shaking it off with ease. Long, on the other hand, cringed as the sticky mess ate at his scales.

Tria took note of the infliction, but figured Long would be fine. She leaned out her window, shooting her vivo a thumbs up as she gave him a command.

"Long, Jaw Slicer on the Stygi!"

Strong legs pumping, Long charged the small creature, his huge body rapidly gaining speed. Then, as he neared the startled biped, he threw his blade up the front of it, knocking it backwards quite hard. It staggered around, attempting to keep balance.

Bentley snarled and joined in on the attack, his thick tail smacking against the Stygi and spinning it around. It was still hanging on, though just barely. Its sides shook with each ragged breath, legs wobbling.

With a terrifying shriek, Anabel descended upon the weakened Stygi, her brown beak smashing into it vigorously. Crying out one last time, it flashed back down to a crimson Gear. The Hypsi US bobbed up and down cheerfully, a proud look in her eyes.

Suddenly, the Dimetro crashed against Bentley, a vengeful scream erupting from its throat. Tria heard a rapid clicking that she assumed was Jura spamming Defense Ups, which were probably keeping the Big Allo in the fight. The vivosaur roared in pain, blood streaking his sky blue flanks.

Quite a bit of writhing ensued, and after quite a few minutes Bentley managed to throw the Dimetro off, albeit losing a chunk of flesh in the process. Man that thing was brutal. As the dark colored reptile skittered away, Tria shouted for a Heavy Charge from Long.

Her finger smashed the Attack Ups as her bladed Sinocera hurtled forward once more. His sword slashed the side of the Dimetro, leaving a nasty gash through its sail and abdominal region. Still it continued to hiss and growl, firmly standing its ground.

"What's that thing on?" Tria grumbled to herself. It seemed very strange that a vivosaur could take as many hits as that thing and keep going strong.

A thick tail courtesy of Bentley came flying in, sweeping the aggressive Dimetro off its feet and throwing it into its Fighter's Bone Buggy. Blood smeared over the hood as it attempted to stand back up, failing miserably. With a groan, the creature finally flashed back to another crimson Gear.

Cheerful roars with a chirr mixed in filled the cave as the two BR Brigade lackeys backed up the Bone Buggies. "Th-they warned us Wardens were strong, but urgghh…" one grumbled, obviously nervous, "We don't stand a chance!"

"WAIT, GUYS! I GOT THE FOSSIL!" the third one yelled, a mix of panic and joy to his tone. The other two cheered, and all of them huddled their vehicles together.

"Let's get out of here! The lieutenants are gonna be happy!"

A really bizarre, warped sound shook the cave. It was sort of like a combination of radio static and metal being bent. A black haze surrounded the BR Brigade trio, which distorted the look of them for a few seconds. Then the darkness collapsed in on itself and they were gone.

What?

At least Becky seemed as confused as she was. "What the- Where- How-?" A frustrated growl. "How the heck did they get out of here?!"

Oh yeah, the fatigue of the day was definitely getting Becky.

She took a deep breath, settling her temper. "Well, this is bad. Those guys were part of the BR Brigade, no doubt about it." Then, all of a sudden, it seemed that what she had just said registered in her brain. "Holy smokes! Jura and Tria! Go report this to Stryker ASAP!"

While Tria agreed that the information was definitely important, she was kind of curious as to why Becky wasn't passing it on. "Are you gonna get some sleep while we do that?"

"Heck no! I've gotta go figure out some new security plans!" Becky replied, a certain hint of paranoia to her voice. She tugged at her hair anxiously. "This is gonna be really _really_ bad."

Oh boy. "Sorry I asked," Tria said, eyes widening a bit. It would be a way better idea to just leave Becky be and do what she asked. Maybe she would tire herself out and go to sleep. "Yeah, we'll go get on reporting this crap."

"Thanks guys!" The blonde paused for a moment, as if thinking something over. "Err, hold on."

"What's up?" Jura asked, concerned. His sister hoped and prayed that he didn't set Becky off in an anxious rant.

She held her Warden License up to the monitor. "As thanks for coming out here with me, let's be Paleo Pals!"

Tria felt her eyes lit up. "Alright! Sounds awesome, Becks!"

Most of her excitement was from the fact that Jura would be getting another friend. She was certain he and Becky would get along better than her and Becky, after all. They were both overly cautious dorks. And Jura having his own friends meant that she got more time with her own friends.

Finally.

* * *

**ALRIGHT-Y, GOT THIS UPDATED.**

**You guys don't understand how important it was for me to update before Friday.  
Yo-Kai Watch 2 comes out Friday and I am HYPED. I figured it would be good to get in an update before then. Who knows how long it might be after I get into that game.**

**But yeah, sorry for the wait. School's been eating away at my creativity. I tried to make this chapter a little longer to make up for it! Hopefully it was good.**


	19. Crying and Picnics

After thanking Daisy for her help, because really she was a _huge_ help, Jura and Tria headed straight to Stryker's office. Jura was already feeling nervous about the whole ordeal. He tugged at his neckerchief as his mind raced through all possible scenarios of how the Captain would take the news. None of them were pleasant.

Tria explained the situation, because honestly Jura didn't think he had it in him to relay it calmly. He was too worried about how upset Stryker would get. If Stryker freaked out, Jura was certain he would just drop dead from fear.

"So that's the skinny, eh? Interesting," Stryker mused calmly, leaning back in his chair. Jura exhaled loudly, attempting to even out his heart rate. He wasn't sure how Stryker could be so calm about something so bad. That must've been why he was Captain.

"I can't believe they unearthed a Mega Electrominite fossil!" Prof. Little exclaimed, more awed than fearful, "That's a truly extraordinary feat! One chunk of a fossil has enough electricity to power a small city." He paused, eyes glancing upward briefly. "Unfortunately, I cannot calculate why the BR Brigade would want such a thing."

Tria snorted, her face brightening. "Go green, Little. Obviously they're just looking out for the environment."

"This is serious, Tria," Jura chided sharply, nudging her lightly to get her attention. His sister rolled her eyes, hands resting on her hips.

"Dr. Blackraven isn't the type of person to use things for the power of good," Stryker added darkly, drawing an annoyed sigh from Tria. Gosh, Jura hated how disrespectful she could be.

The Captain was up on his feet all of a sudden, walking up to the two teens. Jura couldn't help but feel intimidated, what with how much taller Stryker was. His intense expression wasn't helping much, either.

Arms behind his back, Stryker continued. "I have an assignment for the two of you. We have two major tournaments coming up in a week or so; a Fossil Battle event here in Asia, and a Time Attack GP in Europe. I wouldn't be surprised if the BR Brigade has plans to infiltrate them and attack the Parks."

"Dibs on Europe," Tria hissed into Jura's ear. He was overjoyed.

"The tournaments are occurring simultaneously, so a coordinated attack could prove troublesome to handle. You two will have to split up to cover both of them. Do whatever the Leaders say to ensure the tournaments run smoothly and safely." Stryker shifted nervously, staring down at the twins, expectant. It was kind of like he was worried they wouldn't agree to his command. Weird.

Jura was too hung up on not having to be with Tria for that mission, so he couldn't do much more than nod obediently, lest he start grinning like a maniac. Stryker smiled back, motioning for them to leave. "Good luck! I'll make sure to tell everyone you're coming."

"Alright, we'll get on that!" Tria exclaimed, grabbing Jura by the wrist. He was more than happy to follow her for once. It wasn't often he got to wave her off for a week.

They'd barely gotten out of the elevator, and Tria was already shooting off to their room to pack. Jura, feeling freer than he had in a few years, took his own sweet time. He was intercepted by Yamamoto, who seemed very excited about something.

"Jura! I just heard the news!" the blue haired teen beamed, brown eyes filled with awe, "You actually fought the BR Brigade?"

"Uh, yeah, Tria did."

Yamamoto nodded thoughtfully, adjusting his glasses. "I'm impressed she managed to take on a pair of dark vivosaurs. Most fighters-and even some Wardens-would have been scared to try."

Oh. That was why the Dimetro and Stygi looked off. Jura suddenly felt really uncomfortable. "That sounds about right. Tria's never really had strong self-preservation instincts," he laughed weakly, wringing his hands. Yamamoto nodded again, like he was mentally cataloging everything he heard. The thought of that drove Jura into further discomfort.

"What did they look like exactly? I haven't seen a dark vivosaur before," Yamamoto pressed, a look of increasing interest slowly overtaking his enthusiasm.

"Umm... " Jura picked at his memory as fast as he could, barely managing to spit out the vaguest description he'd given in his entire life. "They were weird colored? Also, they looked really mad during the whole fight. One of them was _insanely_ vicious."

More nodding ensued. Gosh, that was getting a little annoying. "Dark energy corrupts anything it comes in contact with-including living tissue. I'm sure that's what caused the discoloration. As for the temperament, theoretically dark energy corrupts the brain as well, which makes vivosaurs behave in a very primal manner."

"That sounds about right," Jura mused, running the battle through his head again. It paused on a rather insignificant detail, but he was still bothered by it. "The Stygi was pretty blotchy, was there any reason for that?"

Yamamoto perked up even more, a finger pushing up his glasses once again. "Too much dark energy can kill a vivosaur. I'm guessing that Stygi wasn't very strong to start with, so they couldn't infuse it with a lot of energy. Then there wasn't enough dark energy to consistently change its appearance, or something along those lines."

Before Jura could answer, Tria shot in between the two of them, a black duffel bag over her shoulder, yelling, "See you later!" at the top of her lungs. She didn't even stop, just kept on charging towards the World Gate. Jura waved awkwardly, still a bit startled.

Tria was gone just as quickly as she had arrived, leaving the two boys standing in silence. Yamamoto cleared his throat, adjusting his glasses yet again, and turned back to Jura. "Well, I should probably get back to work. It was nice talking to you," he beamed, walking off towards Prof. Little's lab.

"Nice talking with you, too!" Jura shouted after him. Once Yamamoto was gone, it suddenly occurred to him that he really had no plans for an entire week, and Tria wasn't there to spurn him on any specific path. Finally, a week to take a breather. He was ecstatic.

Making a very slow beeline to his room, Nibbles in tow, Jura went straight to his bed and whipped out a book on vivosaurs. It wasn't the most up-to-date book, seeing as the information pertained to the vivosaurs found on Vivosaur Island, but it was last year's birthday present, and his parents couldn't afford anything better. He'd basically memorized the whole thing already, but there was something about the book that made him feel really happy and appreciated. It was a nice break from Tria.

Opening to the first image, which as per its fossilary number was a T-Rex, Jura pulled Nibbles over to his side and pointed to the illustration. "You kinda look like that, huh?" the redhead mused, running a finger along the curvature of the T-Rex's spine.

"_Yeah! Yeah!" _Nibbles cheered, tapping his stubby claw-fingers against the picture excitedly. His wide, starry eyes scanned over every detail of the fiery reptile. Then, with a bright trill, the neckerchief clad vivosaur pushed the book out of Jura's hand and examined it on the bed, claws flipping to the next page.

As Nibbles continued to browse, Jura's mind wandered back to when he'd gotten that book. And, just like that, a wave of homesickness hit him. It wasn't a new feeling or anything like that, it was just noticeably more prevalent than before. He swallowed hard, attempting to push the pre-crying lump back down his throat. Holy crap, that settled in fast.

Patting around frantically, Jura's hands searched his pockets, nightstand, and blankets until finally they hit a phone plugged in under his pillow. He was jamming in the number in faster than he thought possible, hand shaking slightly as he held the device to his ear. Maybe Tria was right., maybe he was a huge wimp. His sharp intake of breath upon hearing the groggy voice on the other end say, "Hello?" seemed to confirm that to him.

Taking a few more breaths to keep his voice from cracking, Jura cleared his throat and answered awkwardly, "H-hi, Mom."

"Oh, hi Jura." She sounded vaguely happy, but mostly tired. "Why're you calling at 3 in the morning?"

"S-sorry, forgot about the time difference," he cringed, relaxing upon hearing her laugh, "I just wanted to know how you guys were doing."

She took a deep breath. Jura felt his heart drop. "We're doing alright. Dad got laid off last week, but we're managing."

"Oh," he answered, suddenly becoming hyper aware of the phone in his hand. Shifting slightly, eyes stopping briefly on Nibbles who had made it to S-Raptor's page in the book, he began flipping through better topics to discuss. "How's school going for Creta?"

His mom's voice brightened, "I _think _pretty good. She brings up this one teacher occasionally, can't remember his name, but I think he's her favorite." A brief pause. "Maybe you should call later, she'd probably lose it. Might even chew you out about not going to school."

"Yeah?" Jura grinned slightly, thumb rubbing the edge of his phone. "It's been kinda weird only having Tria out here, anyways."

Another laugh. "I'll bet. Speak of the devil, can you put her on?" She stopped suddenly, muttering "Wait, wait, wait," under her breath. "Not that I don't want to talk to you! It's just, you've been calling like once'r twice a week, and Tria's called once since you guys left."

"Actually-" Fingers strummed against the phone "-she's in Europe right now. We're assigned to different Parks." Jura bit back a grin. "So far it's been nice."

"Well, that's good to hear."

The conversation continued on a rather average path for another half-hour or so, mainly because Jura milked it out as long as possible. His mom eventually forced him to hang up so she could get more sleep before work, which, as much as he didn't want to admit it, was probably more important than calming his wimpy nerves.

After re-plugging his phone into the charger and slipping it under his pillow, Jura brought his attention back to Nibbles. The small vivosaur had reached Carno in the book and was snapping his maw a few times imitatively, starry pupils blazing with inspiration.

"Alright," Jura began slowly, rubbing his hands together, "We're gonna go dig up a bunch of jewels, Nibbles."

"_Jewels?"_ the reptile replied, head tilting.

"Yeah, jewels. We need some money."

* * *

Somehow along the way Jura managed to pick up Nate and Penny to tag along. He hadn't even invited them, Nate just popped up and asked if they could come. He didn't mind Penny so much, but Nate… Well, he supposed having Penny along would be nice.

The three of them went out to Paradise Beach; Nate and Penny insisted on it. Jura started getting a bit suspicious when they immediately drove off and ditched him, but he assumed the best and continued puttering along. Friends or not, those gems wouldn't find themselves. Besides, he had Nibbles with him.

The red vivosaur hunched over Jura's book rather cumbersomely in the passenger seat, buckled in as best he could despite being much too small. His large feet hung awkwardly, kicking from time to time. Jura couldn't help but grin at him.

"You enjoying that book, buddy?"

"_Yeah! Yeah!" _Nibbles cheered, pointing rapidly to a colorful depiction of a Guan.

Green eyes lit up thoughtfully. "Hey, that's a, uh, transforming vivosaur," Jura mused. "Just like you!"

His partner nodded, head bobbing up and down like a bobblehead in an earthquake. Jura stifled a grin and redirected his gaze to the road. "_This is way better than having Tria along."_

Digging was just about as monotonous as Jura envisioned. The only upside was the occasional picture shared from Nibbles. His excitement was beyond contagious, kind of like smallpox.

A couple of hours went by with the same rhythm of digging and laughing with Nibbles. Jura didn't see much of Nate and Penny, much to his chagrin. It kind of seemed like they had tagged along as an excuse to hang out with each other, not him.

The stirrings of annoyance had just begun to grip at Jura's chest when his monitor lit up with Penny's face. "Hey! Come over to the coordinates I sent you!" she beamed, glancing off to the side and puffing up her cheeks a bit. Nate could be heard snickering in the background.

Jura blinked once, narrowing his eyes. "Why...?"

"Just get over here!" The screen flicked off before he had a chance to respond, leaving the red dot of Penny and Nate's presumed location to blink on the map. Biting back a groan, Jura turned to Nibbles.

"What do you think?" he asked slowly, fingers strumming the steering wheel.

Nibbles attempted a thumbs-up despite clearly lacking the necessary digits. "_Go! Go!"_

"Alright," Jura shrugged. Foot gingerly pushing down on the gas pedal, the two of them creeped towards the location.

After traversing through a tunnel and along a sandy bank, Jura's Bone Buggy came to a halt beside Nate and Penny's vehicles. The redhead jumped out of his Rig, Nibbles eagerly tailing him, and stumbled through the sand over to his friends. He hadn't spotted them just yet, but he figured they were behind their Buggies.

Sure enough, Jura's gaze fell upon the duo, who were seated upon a blanket checkered with T-Rexes. Nate's Edapho, Aito, was sunbathing on the beach next to them, whereas Penny's Hypsi, Alto, was attempting to dig through the random bags of snacks scattered over the blanket. These attempts would be foiled each time Penny either scolded her or swatted a clawed mitt away.

"What's all this?" Jura asked, feeling a bit dumbfounded. Both teens beamed, and Penny patted the space on the blanket between them.

"It's a picnic! Duh!" Nate bellowed as Jura took a seat in the designated area. His hand slapped roughly against the redhead's shoulder, giving it a playful shake shortly afterwards. "We figured you could use a little time to chill."

Penny nodded slowly, a concerned expression distorting her normally bright face. "You've seemed kinda down the last few days," she added, fingers tapping against each other, "Nate and I thought something like this would cheer you up."

Jura blinked once, letting the words settle in, then felt a smile slowly creep across his face. "Wow, um… Thanks!" He sniffed once, fighting back the tears threatening to trickle from his eyes. "I guess I've been sorta homesick, is all. Tria's fine and all, but nothing can beat Mom and Dad and our little sister."

Nate's eyes lit up. "Hey! You've got a little sis, too?!" He leaned closer to Jura, who leaned back in response and nearly fell over on to Penny.

"Yes?"

"Dude, that's crazy!" the pink haired teen cheered, pulling on his goggles, "No wonder we're meant to be pals!"

A bit of uncomfortable laughter. "Yeah, uh, sure."

"I can understand the homesickness," Penny added in gently, eyes on Jura but still managing to swipe at Alto's ever-reaching paw without even glancing, "Especially considering the circumstances of how I left…" She got rather sheepish near the end. Luckily, Nate interrupted before things could get weird.

"Alright, enough of this sentimental crap!" he exclaimed, holding up a bag of chips, "Let's eat some of this junk!"

Nate had no sooner finished saying 'junk' before Alto ripped the bag from his hands and tore a hole in the side of it with her beak. Nibbles took in her eccentric method, assumed it was normal, and attempted to do the same with a box of crackers. It didn't really work. In fact, it got stuck on his teeth, and then he started panic running. Jura chased him around the beach for a solid five minutes trying to help.

The rest of the picnic was far more peaceful. Aito slept through the whole thing, which was good because dealing with him _and_ Alto would have been a pain. Nate started off talking about his little sister, Maggie, but then stumbled into a tangent about his Warden assignments. Unfortunately, that included _all_ of the assignments, not just the exciting ones. Jura started to zone out about ten in. Penny, somehow, was able to keep interested, or at least she looked like she was. Either way, he was impressed, especially considering she had been on half of those assignments with Nate.

Just as Nate finished up his last story, which just so happened to coincide with the sun beginning to set, Penny piped up with one quick question."So, what're your plans for the week? You know, with Tria gone and all."

Jura picked his brain over for an answer and, after a moment, realized he didn't have one. So, shrugging, he replied rather nonchalantly, "I guess I'm just seeing where the week takes me. You know, up until the tournament. It always seems like Tria's deciding what we're doing every day, and it gets kind of old really fast, so I figure getting a while to just skate by casually should do me some good." The redhead nodded, mainly to himself, to affirm that he was sticking to that. Penny smiled.

"It's good to see that you're taking care of yourself," she said brightly, running a hand over Alto's back. She'd calmed down, thankfully, and was curled up beside her Fighter. "After all, you've got a fairly stressful job."

Thinking it over, Jura supposed he had to agree with her. "Traveling a lot _has_ been messing with my sleeping schedule."

"Geez, dude, someone as panicky as you definitely needs to sleep a ton," Nate snorted, ruffling Jura's hair for the heck of it, "Otherwise those panic attacks or whatever you have'll be straight up brutal."

Jura laughed, feeling rather pathetic near the end for some reason. "I'll make sure I go to bed early tonight, guys."

A bit more nagging from Penny ensued, which was always backed up with Nate reiterating in a joking manner whatever she said. It took a few cycles of it, but after having Penny bring up whether or not he was doing his laundry and Nate follow it up with a joke about guys hating being bothered about that kind of stuff, a really weird realization hit Jura hard.

Penny and Nate were his honorary mom and dad friends.

* * *

**Hey there friends I'm crawling out of my hole with a really short new chapter.  
Like, this would have been longer but I kinda screwed up my own timeline so now I'm doing a bunch of stuff to repair it quickly.**

**The next chapter should come soon! I've been busy as all get out, but I'm motivated now.  
A lot of the problem was Yo-Kai Watch 2, going into Pokemon Sun and Moon, going into a bunch of huge papers due at school, and then wrapping up with me attempting to write shippy stuff for Sun and Moon, which made me want to work on this again ha ha**

**90% of my drive for writing this story is literally Sean/Ruby and I don't think you guys understand how much it keeps me going**

**Also side apology that my writing style has changed a lot. Like, Jura and Tria might get a little different because of the change and I'm so sorry.**


	20. Games and Guilt

Tria was basically having the time of her life. There was no other way to describe it. Jura's absence left her without a technical conscience, and she ran wild, especially because she hung out with Dahlia every day. Fossil Park Europe was treating her _great_.

Of course, Dahlia wasn't the _only _Warden she got to catch up with. As much as Tria loved doing basically everything with her, there came a time when going on routine jobs, like collecting rent, got a little _too _routine. If there was anything Tria hated, it was getting into a pattern. So, in an attempt to prevent that, she found another sort-of-friend to do stuff with.

"Stryker really lets you not go in on Saturdays?" Tria asked, a bit stunned. She rotated her thumbs on the analog sticks of the game controller in her hands, marvelling at how smoothly they slid in circles.

"Weeelll," Sean began, purposefully clicking his tongue at the end as he leaned over the back of the couch, "Technically speaking, he said we can, like, come in later. And I mean, five seems pretty late to me."

Tria snorted. "Sounds good to me."

Without much warning, Sean wandered off to another room, leaving Tria to take in his house a little more. It had probably the most American atmosphere to it that she could imagine. Like, there were flags on the walls, a whole bunch of dinosaur bones similar to the huge skull in his office, wooden ducks, high ceilings, a wood color scheme in general, an actual _axe_, oh, and a couple of hunting rifles for good measure. Tria fought back the urge to break out laughing, mainly because she figured it would confuse Sean more than anything else. At least his stupid TV was normal enough. Maybe a ton bigger than any she'd ever had, but her family was broke as heck, so the bar was low. Besides, it only made coming over to play videogames that much better.

A loud, somewhat impatient knock hit Tria's ears, followed by Sean jogging past her to get the door. Leaning back to see who was there, Tria snorted and stared with great interest at the tiny, purple-colored witch standing crossly in the doorway. A certain degree of hilarity emerged once she noticed that said witch and Sean were fairly similar in height.

Sean, in his permanently casual way, propped himself up against the door with his arm and cracked a grin. "Howdy, Violet! You got the little scamp with ya?"

Lucky's bright face popped out from behind his mom on cue, waving. "Hi, Sean!" he beamed, darting in past the Branch Leader and straight for the kitchen. There was probably a crap ton of junk food in there, knowing Sean.

"I'm bloody serious this time, Sean," Violet scowled as best she could, despite her weird cat-like smile that prevailed a bit nonetheless, "Don't let him drink anything fizzy, and put him to bed in three hours. He's to get a good night's rest, got it?"

"Yeah, yeah, whatevs," Sean replied, a hint of sarcasm to his voice as he waved dismissively, "Haven't killed him yet, Vi. You just gotta trust me."

Violet took a deep breath and shoved her wand against Sean's chest. "I just want a nice night out, worry free. I'll know if you screw up, got it?" She prodded him a couple of times with the item for good measure.

The blond looked vaguely serious now. "I got it, alright? Chill." He pushed her wand down to her side then, with a smirk, tagged on, "So, any pre_dic_tions for tonight?"

"You're abso-bloody-lutely hilarious, you know that?" Violet replied dryly, hands resting on her hips.

"Aww, c'mon, Vi-"

"One more quip out of you and you're getting this down your throat."

The dip in the wand's heart fit almost perfectly over Sean's throat. Violet held it there for a moment, glaring at his rather smug expression. His lips popped.

"That's kinky."

"Sod you." With a huff, Violet spun around and marched off down the steps. Sean laughed in a friendly manner, half-waving as she went.

"Alright, see ya' tomorrow, then!"

Tria couldn't hear if she said anything back, but Sean rolled his eyes as he closed the door, so it was possible. As he turned back towards the teen, he suddenly looked rather confused. Her huge grin was probably what was doing it.

"What?" Sean asked, genuinely perplexed.

Hand waving about uselessly, Tria picked her limited vocabulary for a non-weird version of what was in her head. "You and Violet are just, uh…"-cute could be taken badly, crud-"frrreaking good friends!" That sounded close enough.

Apparently it was, because Sean cracked a grin and shot her finger pistols. "Heck yeah, we are." He paused, tapped the side of his head a couple of times, and then turned to where Lucky had shot off to. "Yo, Luckster! You heard your mom!"

A very disappointed psychic trudged back into the living room, pouting. "_Seeeaaan_," Lucky whined, head tilting backwards. Said blond ruffled his hair in reply, taking the opportunity to nudge Lucky's head back to its original angle.

"Look, kiddo," Sean started, taking a deep breath as he rested his hands on his waist, "we gotta stay in line nowadays. Ya' got freakin' kidnapped. We keep doing this, some grody stuff's gonna go down." He rubbed his hands together, glancing off to the side. "And, uh, your mom's probably gonna make it go down."

"He's got a point, dude," Tria chimed in, hanging her arms over the back of the couch. Face scrunching up, Lucky sent a frustrated scowl to Sean as his tiny hands balled up into unthreatening fists.

"But I've never had to before!"

A thumbs up came from Sean. "There's a first time for everything!" he beamed, attempted to sell the statement with a flashy grin. Lucky wasn't buying it. On the contrary, he was taking the product and putting it purposefully on the wrong shelf for another, less fortunate customer to find later.

Upon seeing the newer, angrier look from Lucky, Sean returned to tapping the side of his head. "Tell ya' what…" He snapped his fingers, "You don't drink any pop so I stay groovy with your mom, and I'll letcha have ice cream for breakfast."

Gold eyes lit up at the proposition. "Okay!" Lucky beamed instantly, like the previous disagreement hadn't occurred. Tria smirked, amusement bubbling up from her chest at the whole situation. Well, mainly Lucky. That kid knew how to play people.

Speaking of Lucky, the chestnut haired kid plopped down next to Tria on the couch, bright eyes boring into her skull. "Hey, Tria!" he chirped, hands in fists that seemed more excited than frustrated, "Long time no see! How've you been?"

She shrugged, his mood shift just then sinking in completely and leaving her a bit baffled. "Pretty okay, I guess. Fairly average." The sudden addition of people was really leaving her brain overworked, gosh. Coming up with that much small talk was just stupid. "Why, uh, why're you here?" ...And that came out ruder than it was supposed to. Crap.

Thankfully for Tria, Lucky was a few years short of recognizing her tone really well, despite being incredibly good at tones himself. "Mum and Da's anniversary's today," he grumbled whilst rolling his eyes, "And Mum wanted me outta the house."

"Good call," Tria snorted, immediately diverting a nervous glance to the wall upon noticing the confused stare from Lucky. She just kept smiling, hoping he wouldn't ask what she meant.

"What're we playing, Luckster?" Sean interrupted, much to Tria's relief. The psychic looked over towards him, barely hesitating.

"The one with the cars! I'm good at that one!"

He wasn't. Oh gosh, he wasn't.

Tria found out pretty fast that she was, though. The only issue there was that, and she was a bit frustrated it hadn't occurred to her beforehand, Lucky was getting pretty ticked off that he wasn't in first place in the race. And normally, she wouldn't give a crap because of how competitive she was. It was the elbow to her side from Sean, combined with some stupidly sappy look that just screamed 'let Lucky win', that was getting on her nerves.

So, on the last lap, Tria begrudgingly ran her vehicle into a tree and watched as Lucky whizzed by her and past the finish line. Freaking spoiled brat. She was no longer entertained by his manipulation skills; no one who outdid her ever cracked her up. Even if it was kind of a fluke.

They kept that sort of pattern up for an hour or so, switching games once or twice. Purposefully losing to Lucky was really getting on her nerves. Like, hardcore on her nerves. Tria was desperate to get out of there.

She randomly checked her phone between games and, biting back a sigh of relief, saw that Dahlia had texted her. All it said was "u busy". Tria had never typed "no" faster in her life.

The resulting, rather pathetic exchange of words conveyed that Dahlia had a couple of friends to introduce Tria to, if she wanted to meet them. And Tria, being the incredibly petty person she was, obviously wanted to meet her friends. At that exact moment.

So, with very little hesitation, Tria hopped up to her feet. That caught Lucky's attention almost instantly, which he vocalized loudly.

"Where're you going, Tria?" he inquired, a stubborn frown on his face, like he knew what she was up to. Joke's on him, Sean was the one making her feel vaguely guilty.

"_It's not too late,"_ Morton piped up seemingly out of nowhere, but really out of her pocket. He emanated a parental sternness that just ticked Tria off more than anything. "_You could say you're getting a drink, then go get one. It's not too hard."_

Tria clasped her hands together loudly, shooing away the remnants of Morton's presence. "One'a my friends needs help with something," she forced out surprisingly well. One could hardly tell she was lying.

"_Gosh darn it, Tria."_

"Yeah, alright," Sean said, waving at her. He had this look of total confidence to him that made Tria feel like a jerk. So, she just sort of left. Like, she said 'bye', but then left immediately.

Upon reaching Fossil Park Europe, any nastiness swelling up in her chest vanished. She didn't feel guilty, because no one reminded her to be.

* * *

**Howdy friends yeah this isn't here with good news.**

**SO I had this much of the chapter done in like February, and then I got REALLY busy, and now exams are coming and I'm writing a book for a class and I'm gonna have a job then college and ugh. Not really sure how I'll be able to keep up on the story in this sort of format, so consider this either a hiatus or a bunch of choppy bits of what I originally wanted thrown on to the end of this beast.**

**Gosh I wish I could have finished this. Thought it would be good to share what little I did have done, though, so here you guys go.**


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